III

ZEN

SEEING INTO OUR ORIGINAL NATURE*

(Draft, 2010)

David Paul Boaz (Dechen Wangdu)

*Excerpted from The Nature of Mind: The New Reformation in Religion Science and Culture,

©David Paul Boaz, 2010. All rights reserved. Copper Mountain Institute, info@coppermount.org,

www. coppermount.org, www.davidpaulboaz.org, 505-898-9592

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The View, Path and Result

The View: Zen Mind, No Self, and the Wisdom of Kindness

"From the beginning all beings are Buddha."

-Hui-neng

Zen, Ch'an (Dhyana), as with the other paths here considered, has its outer exoteric

and inner esoteric understanding of the View, Path and Result. In the major traditions of

our great Primordial Wisdom Tradition, the View of the nature of ultimate reality—the

Ground—establishes the Path or Meditation which ultimately accomplishes the Result or

Fruition of the View and Path. In Buddhism this Result is Buddhahood. The committed

student practices both the exoteric, esoteric and ‚innermost secret‛ aspects of the View

and Path in order to accomplish the Result. These distinctions of course, are dualistic

conceptual subject-object elaborations. Essentially, prior to conceptual thought, there is

no difference. Whether esoteric or exoteric, whether tongo (sudden enlightenment) or

zengo (gradual enlightenment), Zen is ultimately Buddhadharma transmission from

heartmind to heartmind, master to student, to world. Esoterically Zen is not bound to

Buddhism. As with Dzogchen, Zen is the nondual (beyond subject and object, concept and

belief) completion or perfection (primordial Ultimate Bodhicitta, Bussho, Fukatoku), the

indwelling heartmind presence (vidya, rig pa) of the Primordial Ground that is the prior

unity of samsara and nirvana. In this radical nondual view, samsara and nirvana are the

same. There is no essential difference. That is what must be realized. That is the intrinsic

primordial awareness wisdom liberated now, just as it is.

Exoterically, Zen is a path to the goal of enlightenment. Esoterically, Zen is not a

method or a path to a goal. Zen is immediate experience of our prior Buddha Nature,

already present in the human form, always awake, here now. Zen is the release from our

egoic self-contraction away from the sourceground. It is this egoic habitual, chronic

contraction that obstructs realization of the self-perfected state of our actual, nature, our

original face. The concept of a path to this realization implies a dualism of present

location and future destination. Enlightenment is always in the future. Perish the

thought. The miraculous paradox is this: the perennial wisdom truth is that from the

beginning the primordial presence of the Ground, our supreme source is always present,

awake, at the spiritual heart (hridyam/kokoro) of each human being. Our heart’s desire? ‚It

is already accomplished.‛ This is the paradox of the ‚spiritual path.‛ The great nondual

liberation that is the realization of our always present Buddha Nature, this ultimate

‚Happiness Itself‛ is already the case. As Maya, the veil of ignorance (avidya, ajnana,

marigpa) is consumed, this truth becomes a continuity of recognition, as our self-centered

material and spiritual strategies for seeking happiness yield to the compassionate

wisdom of kindness that is none other than our own happiness. Such is the paradoxical

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logic of human happiness.

Perhaps the greatest expression of the wisdom of Mahayana Buddhism is found in

the Heart Sutra (from the Prajnaparamita Sutra): "Form is emptiness, emptiness is form."

(To approach these Perfection of Wisdom Sutras we must consult the profound

interpretations of Nagarjuna, Chandrakirti, Tsongkapa, and Longchenpa). Our

attachment to, or "gaining idea" of this truth is however, according to Suzuki Roshi,

dualistic (p. 207). Form is "I", and emptiness is something else. There is a perceiving

subject separate from its object. Further, "I" desire to possess or to realize ‚the goal‛ of

"emptiness" realization through "my" activity of zazen (meditation). There is a

subject/object, self/other split. There is a dualism of ‚my meditation‛ and my already

present Buddha Nature. Yet the Sutra continues: "Form is form, emptiness is emptiness."

This is the nondual, no separation view. Form and emptiness are a prior unity. The

dualistic practice of ‚form is emptiness, emptiness is form,‛ is just the necessary

beginning. Beginning practice is always dualistic. When we forget about ourselves, about

trying to gain something for ourselves, then our concern for others spontaneously arises.

Skillful kindness spontaneously arises. And this is happiness. This process is the great

secret of wu-wei, effortless non-seeking surrender to our primordial source, Tao. The

activities, images and appearances of mind continue to arise, but there is no attachment,

no self to cling to them, therefore no egoic self motive or "gaining idea." Therefore no

Karma. Whatever arises, pure or impure, is allowed to ‚self-liberate‛ at the very instant

of its arising. This is the nondual practice of "form is form, emptiness is emptiness." When

Ummon was ill he was asked "How are you?" He responded, "Sun-faced Buddha, Moon-

faced Buddha." Always Buddha. There is no dilemma. No problem. No dualism. There

are apparent differences, but no essential difference in all of these arising independent

existences, our myriad spacetime realities. Samsara and nirvana are identical. Form is

form, emptiness is emptiness. We are form (epistemological realism). We are emptiness

(epistemological idealism). Form and emptiness are a prior unity. These Two Truths

cannot be separate. Thus there is one truth and it transcends, yet embraces all assertions,

all predicates, all concepts about it. This Ultimate Truth that is nondual Reality Itself

cannot be grasped by the concept-mind. Ultimately it can only be realized through the

‚pristine cognition‛ (dharmadhatujnana) that is our innate Buddha mind. ‚Truth is One.

Many are its names‛ (Rig Veda). "The only difference between a Buddha and an ordinary

person is that one realizes it, the other does not... Everything is Buddha from the

beginning" (Hui-neng).

So, self-centered, dualistic practice is merely the beginning. Dogen said, "shoshaku

jushaku," continue in error. "Establish your practice in your delusion." Even in delusion,

our Buddha mind is always present. Just to continue with a single-minded effort, from

mistake to mistake, is the essence of the Zen master's life; is the essence of the life in Zen.

‚Success is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm‛ (Winston Churchill).

No problem. ‚Have a cup of tea.‛

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Thus, form is just form, emptiness is just emptiness. Nothing more need be added. If we

think we are accomplishing something special, our pride changes it. Pride is added baggage,

the egoic "gaining idea" that derails our practice.

The ultimate nature of mind, of Reality Itself, is emptiness. In emptiness there is no

self. Since there is no self, there is no path. Since there is no path, there is no goal. So there

is nothing to seek and nothing to gain. Thus our activity is selfless, and happy.

‚When ‘self’ occurs, so the thought of ‘other.’ From ‘self-and-other’ both attachment

and aversion come. These two combined are the source of every ill‛ (Dharmakirti). This

simple formula states the perennial problem of human evil. The antidote is our Buddha

Nature, the selfless, unseparate, nondual original nature of us. This is simply the

primordial wisdom Truth of What Is. Regardless of what we think or believe, What Is, is.

Our thoughts, concepts and beliefs about it are merely limits, relative conditions of

What Is. Then we become the defensive advocates of these limits. To see this truth in

each moment is the nondual practice. "Perfect practice" then is the paradox of shoshaku

jushaku. Begin right now, where you are. Continue to practice the teachings, and just

continue. Never quit! Zen is simply seeing Buddha in everyday routine, in whatever arises,

in whatever we do. Right here lives our original nature. Nothing special. So now, all that

we do is spontaneous, authentic and kind.

Dogen Zenji said, "To give is non-attachment." Giving is the way of being happy.

Dana Prajna Paramita means to "give" (dana) "wisdom" (prajna) at "each crossing," each

step (paramita). To surrender (pistas / faith) desire/attachment to what appears, each

moment, each step of our crossing of the river of our life, is giving. What we give is not

the point. To give or surrender our egoic attachment to a wrong view, or a concept, or an

opinion when we find that we are defensive; that is giving. To give a little kindness, or a

bit of encouragement, a dollar, a poem, a truth of the teaching, a generous word, when

given with little or no egoic gaining idea, that is the wisdom of Zen giving. This is true

service to another, and through that we serve our own happiness. It is urgent to

understand that, according to our Great Wisdom Tradition—whatever we do to lesson

our habitual, narcissitic, egoic self-sense, and to expand our generous kindness in the

service of reducing the suffering of other beings—increases our own happiness.

In Tibetan Buddhism this practice of giving without any gaining idea is tonglen. This

wisdom of kindness is compassion (karuna), just as compassion is wisdom (prajna).

“Practice these two as a unity.‛ Such giving has absolute value that cannot be lost, even

when it goes unrecognized. As we really begin to see the self-centered separateness of our

effort at giving, we realize that our egoic attachment to all that we fear to give, or lose is

illusory. Everything is interdependent, utterly connected. This is the great truth of

interdependence (pratitya samutpada). Everything is transient and passes away. This is the

great truth of impermanence (anitya). There is no essential intrinsic self (anatman) to

defend. This is the great truth of selflessness. So we are all connected and everything

changes. Everything now is already gone. Gaté, Gaté. Gone beyond. The transcendence

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of ego-self and its illusory objects is already accomplished! This is what is. This is our

choiceless choice. The present realization now of this primordial wisdom truth is the

great mystery, the wondrous truth of wu wei (surrender / no seeking). This is the way of

Tao. And this is the supreme view and practice of Zen. Now there is nothing left to do.

Thus does the wisdom of kindness spontaneously arise in every thought and action, and

in all that we do. So now be supremely happy!

Shoshin: The Beginner’s Mind

This opening to receive everything given, and giving it again, moment to moment,

without attachment or clinging, or any "gaining idea" is the essence of what Dogen Zenji

and Suzuki Roshi call shoshin, "beginners mind." Beginners mind is Zen mind. With open

mind, empty mind—free of concept and belief and negative emotion—the mind receives

directly that which is given by reality to the senses and the heart. As the egoic concept-

emotive logic of the discursive, rational mind is undermined by meditation and

transmission from the master, step by step, the luminous primordial suchness, thatness,

isness, emptiness, (Tathata, shunyata, Wu/Mu) that lives prior to the mind, that is source of

the mind, is revealed, and in due course, integrated. That is what is to be realized. That is

who we are between two thoughts. That is who we are before the kosmos was born.

Who is it? "What is Buddha Nature?" "What is Zen?" "Who am I?" The answers lie not

in thought, but in the realization of the source or basis of all of That, everything that arises.

That is the deepest expression of our primordially pure original nature. That is the original

nature that is our Buddha mind, our supreme source in whom all objects and all minds

arise. It is That that cannot be grasped and understood by dualistic concept mind. Yet,

wonder of wonders, this presence is always present, at the heart (kokoro, hridyam),

conceptually unelaborated, unfabricated, here, now ‚perfect just as it is.‛

Perhaps, above all, Zen mind is openness to the direct "heartmind to heartmind"

transmission (denbo) from the master; for without the wisdom intervention of the master,

the heart-mind cannot awaken from its dualistic egoic slumber. Yet the master can only

mirror, guide and point. "My understanding has nothing to do with your understanding"

(Issan). "This cannot be taught" (Gautama Buddha). The student must arrive at his/her

own, unique understanding. The master merely mirrors That that is always already

present, awake, at the spiritual heart of the student.

One of the great truths of our primordial Perennial Wisdom is this: without the

guidance and love of the master, spiritual practice cannot begin to outwit the prideful

defenses of the intellectual and the spiritualized ego. The ego-self is truly a false guru. It is

told many ways. It is told in each of the traditions of our great Primordial Wisdom

Tradition. One who chooses to act as his/her own guru has a profoundly foolish student.

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What Is Zen? “Open Mouth, Already A Mistake”

What is the very essence or nature of mind—the nature of reality itself—beyond our

thoughts, concepts and beliefs about it? What is this bright primordial awareness of mind

without conceptual content? Thoughts, and the process of thought cannot think beyond

itself, transcend itself, any more than the eye can see itself. "Who are you between two

thoughts?" It is dualistic even to think about Zen. ‚Open mouth, already a mistake‛ (Issa).

There appears then, need of a bridge from the "dogmatic slumber" of reason to the

truth of That (tathata) that lies beyond, that transcends yet embraces the thinking, feeling

bodymind. Even if there were nothing beyond this, reason and "objective science" demand

that we explore "the beyond" to discover this for ourselves. ‚To thine own self be true‛

(Socrates). Otherwise we have only our subjective unexamined opinions—subjective

metaphysical assumptions—of the transcendental and the transpersonal. Indeed, the

weight of our entire Great Wisdom Tradition urges us to go beyond—gate, gate, paragate—

the lifestage limits of our present concept and belief systems. Do we not profoundly limit

ourselves by our attachment and defense of these ever changing concepts and beliefs?

Thus, Zen is the bridge between human reason and the nondual emptiness base or

source in whom everything arises. Zen is the practice of the subject seeking to know its

object. Zen is that which the subject seeks, which the knowing subject finally "sees" or re-

cognizes (zenki, zenkan), and ultimately realizes (kensho/satori) at ever deepening levels.

Zen mind as shoshin, the beginner's mind (empty mind) is, with zazen (meditation), the

bridge, the way, the method, and the daily practice. Zen mind as kensho/satori/daigio tetei

is the basis of the recognition of this primordial base. Zen mind/Buddha mind is That

(Tathata) that is to be realized. Zen mind is the nondual identification, then integration of

the seeking/ knowing "subject" with the transcendental "object" of "knowledge" such that

the ego or self (yuga) is absorbed, enlightened and transcended (muga). Zen is the "goal".

Zen is the very essence or nature of mind. Zen is the Way (path). Zen is the bridge that

makes the goal the path until the bridge itself is transcended in its nondual source. Zen is

everyday routine. "Nothing special" (wu shin). Zen is the paradoxical negation of all of the

above concepts. Zen is the surrender of any and ultimately all such speculation about the

Zen of What Is. Zen is the understanding of the foolishness of the endeavor of the crutch

and buttress of explanation. Such is the paradox of Zen.

"What is Zen?" asked a novice monk.

Master Hyakuja replied, "It's like riding an ox, and seeking to find it."

Said the student, "After we understand; then what is it?"

The master replied, "It's like riding an ox, and going home on it."

Asked the student, "Then, what do we do with it?"

"It's like an ox-herd who keeps it out of other people's rice fields."

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What is Zen? "Three pounds of rice." What is enlightenment? "A dead stump to tie

your donkey to" (Te Shan). Is Zen a religion? "In vast emptiness (shunyata), there is

nothing holy" (Bodhidharma). "With much clay you can make a large Buddha." Zen is not

sacred. Nor is anything else. "All that can be shaken shall be shaken." Zen is not tolerant

of the dogma of exoteric organized religious praxis.

The Path: Integrating Wisdom and Compassion

Exoterically, zazen is formal sitting meditation, a yoga or method, or practice through

which the dualistic perceptions and conceptions of the thinking mind are transcended in

their nondual source. Zazen is the bridge between the relative, conditional truths of

reason and causality and that supreme source. As subject-object dualism (the linear, two-

valued, true-false dichotomies of thought) is the defining characteristic and very nature

or condition of thought and its logical syntax of language, thinking must be transcended,

then reintegrated. Concept-mind must be deracinated of compulsive conceptual thinking

and ideation in order to integrate the reality that abides beyond (gate, gate). Thoughts and

the experience of mind (nyam) continue to arise, but there is no egoic self-sense, no

attachment, not even to yogic bliss. Experience is thereby self-liberated or transcended at

the very instant of its arising. However, the "lower" aspect of mind (ego, yuga, manas), and

the always already present and prior "higher" aspect of mind (muga, bodhi,

gnosis/jnana/yeshe, primordial wisdom) are apparently separate. Exoterically

(dualistically) then, zazen is the yogic bridge that links them. (The Sanskrit “yoga”—

linking or union of the lower with the higher—is the etymological root of the Latin “religio”

from which the English ‚religion‛ is derived.) It is the practice of zazen that frees the mind

of its attachment or clinging to the objects of its thoughts, visions and images (even

sublime great images) as they arise from the "lower" mind. Zazen illumines the

intellectual egoic mind with the luminous, pure clear light of the source (bodhi) where the

dualism of the reality of samsara is transcended and the realization that samsara (the cycles

of suffering of the phenomenal world) and nirvana (what remains after the ego is "blown

out", like a flame) are identical. Esoterically, this process is realization of prajna

(conventional, discriminating wisdom) and jnana/yeshe (nondual Primordial Awareness

Wisdom), the awakening to the Buddha Nature or Buddha essence (Bussho) which is the

essential emptiness base (shunyata) or Suchness (Tathata) of nondual Reality Itself. The

expression of that in the world is compassion (hesed, caris, karuna), for wisdom is

compassion, and compassion is wisdom. Where karuna is manifested, there is prajna.

Where prajna is manifested, there is karuna. Where karuna is objective, prajna is subjective.

Where prajna is objective, karuna is subjective. Prajna descends; karuna ascends. They are

the same. ‚Descend with the view (prajna). Ascend with the conduct (karuna). Practice

these two as a unity‛ (Padmasambhava). ‚Make the goal the path.‛ This intention to

integrate the goal and the path is accomplished to reduce the suffering of beings. We

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dedicate anything and everything good that we understand and accomplish to this great

theme. This is the great essence of the Mahayana, and the very heart of Zen.

Advanced Zen Practice

Suzuki Roshi's lineage continues Dogen's tradition of the nondual practice of Shikan-taza

(Chih Kuan or shamatha-vipashyana) meditation based in "faith" (pistis, ego surrender) without

an idea or object. Chih means tranquil mind (mindfulness). Kuan means insight from

contemplation of shunyata (emptiness).1 Shikantaza is ‚advanced‛ formless meditation using

neither a koan, nor the following of the breath, nor a deity, nor any idea or image whatsoever.

At the root of this practice is the profound faith and understanding that the single-minded

persistence of the practice of objectless sitting mediation (zazen) and the following of the

master's "pointing out" instruction (denbo during dokusan and tiesho), will surely lead to

liberation, the realization/enlightenment of that prior, inherent condition that is our original

nature, the Buddha Nature present in every sentient being, and indeed in all phenomenal

existence. We are not separate from That. Thus, there is no need of effort or intention to

become enlightened. Indeed, such a "gaining idea" will prevent it. (This is precisely the view

of Dzogchen, Ch.II). The greatest barrier to enlightenment (kensho/satori) is the idealization

and dramatization of it. It is "nothing special" (wu shin). With practice, it comes and goes,

and comes and goes—without effort (wu-wei)— until, ultimately, it comes and goes

moment to moment now, forever. This result, this fruition, is known as Buddhahood.

Shikantaza is an advanced practice for those who have developed equanimity, a subtle

and stable practice, and a profound desire for enlightenment. Such an adept has usually

spent years at sitting zazen and walking zazen (kinhin) and has experience as the Witness,

dwelling at the root of attention, prior to the objects and images of thought and idea

(Appendix A, lifestages 5 and 6). The Zen practitioner and the non-practitioner live not

in reality, but in his or her ideas or concepts about it. Zen practice is the purifying or

distillation of attention, in all aspects of life, such that reality is experienced directly as

it is (kensho/shoshin)—at the root of attention—untainted by concept, belief, or

negative or positive emotion, even as it arises through body, voice and mind in the

everyday lifeworld of "hewing wood and carrying water."

A man once asked master Ikkyu, "What is the greatest wisdom?" The master wrote

with his brush the word "Attention."

The man inquired further, "But surely there must be something more, something

profound," the man implored.

Quickly Master Ikkyu wrote, "Attention, Attention, Attention."

"Just what does attention mean anyway," The man demanded.

Spoke the master, "Attention means Attention."

In the advanced nondual yoga practices of Saijojo Zen, Dzogchen, Essence Mahamudra,

1 Yasutani Roshi prescribes “Shikantaza” („just sitting‟) for advanced students.

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Advaita Vedanta, and Tao all thought forms, mind forms, objects, visions, images, even

great and sacred images (avataric and deity forms), are transcended in their nondual

source. Here, dwelling at the root of attention, abides the great mystery of the nondual

Primordial Awareness Wisdom, Tao, Absolute Consciousness-Being Itself, Dharmakaya,

Samantabhadra, Nirguna Brahman. Ultimately the dualism of attention itself is released (6th

and 7th stage practice) as the ‚state of presence‛ (Atman, vidya, rigpa, logos/Christos) of the

Absolute Ground is lived moment to moment, while moving and acting in kindness and

compassion through the world. To be sure, a most amazing paradox.

Nansen and a student were having a cup of tea. The student asked the master, "What

is the true secret of Zen?" The master poured the student a cup of tea until it overflowed.

Then he spoke, "Like this cup, you are filled to overflowing with your own ideas. How

can I show you the secret unless you offer me an empty cup?"

Master Shozan was addressing his students on the dualism of thought. Raising his

staff he spoke, "If you call this a staff, you deny it's eternal truth; if you do not call it a

staff, you deny it's present fact. What exactly do you call it then?"

The Result: Seeing Into Unity of the Two Truths

‚That everything is included in your mind, is the essence of mind.‛

- Suzuki Roshi

Zen is the liberating Result, the Fruition of the View and the Path. Just so, Zen is

esoterically, the spirit or essence of all religion, morality, art, and culture. For without this

spirit of Zen there is only the exoteric, conventional, the academic, the alienated and the banal.

Thus Zen is, to the relative-conventional understanding, as arrogant and impudent as it is

humble. As Zen is perfection or Buddha Essence in potential or latent form, it cannot be

praised or blamed. To the concept-mind Zen is altogether paradoxical.

Zen is the fruition of the combined genius not only of India, China and Japan, but of

our entire Primordial Wisdom Tradition. Thus, like Dzogchen, Zen is not merely a

religion or a philosophy which changes and evolves like the prevailing views of

exoteric religion, science and culture. As Relative Truth (form), Zen is the manifested

change and evolution of the ever changeless Tao. As Ultimate Truth (emptiness) Zen is

the ever changeless Tao Itself, the very ground of being in whom form arises. Zen is

the tantric continuum of enlightenment and illusion, nirvana and samsara, good and evil.

Zen is the process of the holarchic reconciliation, inclusion and transcendence of all

dualistic spacetime reality in its unbroken whole, the primordial sourceground itself.

Thus, Zen is the coalescence of the Two Truths. "Where goodness, beauty and truth are all

present as one, there is Zen" (R.H. Blyth).

"Zen is not a state but an activity" (R.H. Blyth). Satori/Enlightenment, like love, is not a

state, or a feeling, or an experience, but an activity, a continuity of discrete recognitions of the

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Nature of mind—‛brief moments many times‛— continuous from now, to now, to now.

Paradoxically, this "remaining naturally in the state‛ (satori/ vidya/rigpa) is the activity of

choosing nondual reality—moment to moment—over any other activity or state. Therefore,

ego (yuga) and the egolessness (muga) of no-mind (transcendence of the dualism of mind) are

both necessary parts of the process of Zen mind and Zen practice. Indeed, we accomplish

muga through yuga. We must always remember, these two are not ultimately separate, but are

actually an unseparate, non-conceptual prior unity. (We can make no ultimate non-conceptual

assertion whatsoever about unity, or anything else because assertions are conceptual

statements). We must have the discomfort, the "pinchability" of ego to provide the motive to

transcend it. The transcendence of egoity then, with the resulting liberating wisdom and

compassion is the fruit or result of Zen.

The nondual wisdom of emptiness recognizes the prior unity of the Two Truths—ultimate

and relative. From ultimate emptiness the forms of relative spacetime reality arise

interdependently (dependent arising, pratitya samutpada) from prior causes and conditions.

‚Cause and effect are just as real as they are unreal‛ (R.H. Blyth). Without this emptiness base,

no arising. With no arising, no suffering, no compassion, no Buddhas. It takes these two

truths to understand the one truth that is Reality Itself. The nondual awakening to this truth

is the fruition of Zen that may result in Buddhahood. Again, at this level of non-conceptuality

we can make no assertions about reality or Buddhahood, or anything else. This Buddha Mind,

the very Nature of Mind, can only be realized directly—not at some future moment—but in

this very moment now.

Therefore, from the view of Relative Truth, Buddhahood has a cause—the ego and its

transcendence through the sadhana of the praxis of the path. Yet, ‚From the beginning all

beings are Buddha.‛ We are already Buddha mind. So Buddhahood is already our actual

nature now. Yet it has a cause that makes it a future event (p.211). Our Great Wisdom

Tradition resolves this paradox through the profound teaching of ‚The Two Truths‛

(Chap.II). Again, there is the all too real dimension of ‚Relative Truth,‛ (samvriti satya),the

unfolding of the ‚real‛ subject-object world of objective cause and effect—relative-

conventional reality—and then there is the dimension of ‚Ultimate Truth‛ (paramartha

satya), the atemporal, acausal, nondual unbroken whole that enfolds and embraces, yet

transcends the relative spacetime dimension, and in whom its phenomena arise and

participate. We live in these two worlds—the finite and the infinite—at once! And the

secret is seeing these two, always—moment-to-moment—as an ultimate unity. The

liberating result of this moment-to-moment recognition that is realization is meditative

stabilization that may ultimately result in Buddhahood, the great happiness that cannot be

lost.

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Only the truly intelligent understand the principle of the identity of all

things. They do not view things as apprehended by themselves,

subjectively, but transfer themselves into the position of the things

viewed. And viewing them thus they are able to comprehend them,

and to master them. . . So it is that to place oneself in subjective relation

with externals, without losing objectivity - this is Tao.

- Chung Tzu (author’s translation)

And Tao is Zen.

So the fundamental principle of the Zen of nondual seeing is the simultaneous

transcendence and inclusion of the subject-object spilt of dualistic perceptual and

conceptual cognition of the continuum of the arising kosmos. ("Kosmos" here is the

Pythagorean kosmos which transcends and includes the objective, physical phenomena of

the mere spacetime cosmos.) And Zen is the liberating pristine cognition-Buddha gnosis-

the recognition, then realization of the prior ontological unity of relative and absolute

(The Two Truths) that is the nondual Nature of Mind. This essential mind essence is our

supreme identity whose essence is primordial emptiness, whose nature is luminous

clarity, and whose expression or manifestation is ultimate compassion (Ultimate

Bodhicitta). In human beings this ultimate compassion is spontaneously expressed as

compassionate activity—the wisdom of kindness—that is Relative Bodhicitta, the relative

‚cause‛ of Buddhahood.

A Brief History of Zen

Historically, Buddhism has profoundly changed, and has been changed, by each

country it has entered. Zen (Ch'an in China) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism which

entered China from India in about 521 AD with Bodhidharma (Daruma, 470-543), the

twenty-eighth patriarch of Indian Buddhism and the first patriarch of the Ch'an/Zen

tradition. Bodhidharma's Shobo Genzo, a profound collection of teisho (commentaries), is

perhaps the greatest work in traditional Zen literature. Thus the Buddhadharma (Jap.

Buppo, the Dharma (truth) teachings of Shakyamuni, the historical Buddha) continues in

Zen as an unbroken "heartmind to heartmind" transmission lineage from Shakumuni, the

Buddha. It continues today throughout the world.

Zen is the short form of Zenna which is a Japanese translation of the Chinese Ch'an

(Ch'an-na) which translates the Sanskrit dhyana, meaning meditation (contemplation) on

emptiness (shunyata) the nondual source or nature of mind prior to, or beyond, or

transcendent of all relative mind’s dualistic distinctions. The Indian dhyana Buddhism of

Bodhidharma blended with the Taoism of China to produce the great tradition of Ch'an

Buddhism during the T'ang period with many great Ch'an masters, including the great sixth

patriarch Hui-neng (Eno, 638-713). Hui-neng founded the Southern School with its new

emphasis on tongo (sudden enlightenment). While the Northern School remained obscure, the

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Southern School evolved into the "five houses/seven schools" (goke-shichishu). Other great

masters of the T'ang and early Sung periods included Mat Su (Baso), Hyakujo, Tozan and

Sozan (founders of Soto Zen), Joshu, Rinzai (founder of Rinzai Zen) and Ummon, author of

the Mumonkan (1220) which includes the famous Mu koan (p.200).

Two of these lineages, Rinzai and Soto were exported from China to Japan and have

since spread throughout the world. At the end of the 12th Century Eisai Zenji (1144-1215)

brought Rinzai Zen (Oryo lineage) to Japan (1191). Early in the 13th Century the great Zen

master, Dogen Zenji (1200-1253) brought the Soto lineage to Japan. Soto was founded by

Tozun (807-869) and Sozan (840-901). Soto is the first two letters in the Japanese name of

each. The Rinzai school was founded by Rinzai (d. 803).

Both traditions taught the essentials of the Ch'an tradition (seeing into one's actual

original nature which is Buddha Nature (Kensho/Satori), but placed different emphasis on

zazen and the use of the koan. In Soto, sitting mediation (zazen as mokusho) is stressed over

koan (kanna) practice. Dokusan, the private direct transmission (denbo) sessions between

master and student, and tiesho (the Roshi's commentaries) have been a fundamental part of

Ch'an/Zen practice, and is still practiced with varying emphasis in Rinzai Zen and Soto Zen

throughout the world.

While Zen flourished in Japan, Ch'an in China blended with Pure Land Buddhism (the

cult of Amitabha, Jap. Amida) in the Sung and Ming periods (1279 forward) and the great

tradition of Chinese Ch'an lineage transmission came to an end.

The great reformers of the Ch'an/Zen tradition were Hui-neng (630-713), the 6th and

last Ch'an Patriarch, and the great 18th Century Rinzai Zen reformer Hakuin Ekaku (1687-

1768). (p. 182)

It was Hui-neng who accomplished the synthesis of Indian Mahayana dhyana

Buddhism (with its emphasis on both sitting mediation/zazen, and intellectual teaching)

with the active and practical philosophy of the Chinese Taoism of Lao Tsu and his great

disciple, Chuang Tsu.

Taoism emphasized the practical understanding of the eternal flow of change of the

changeless supreme source, the nondual unbroken whole that is Tao. In contrast to the

Indian mind, the Chinese mind could not accept the monkish lifestyle of the dhyana

practitioners. Anyone who wouldn't work was suspect. It was Hui-neng and his immediate

lineage, the great masters Ma Tsu (Baso), Nansen and Joshu who integrated the bringing of

the "heaven" of dhyana into the "earth" path of "hewing wood and carrying water." The

monk who didn't work, didn't eat. To this day Zen practice emphasizes meditation (dhyana)

and enlightenment (kensho/satori) not in the zendo (meditation hall), but at work (samu) and

in the spiritual crucible of the marketplace. Hui-neng's great teaching legacy to us is in the

great Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch (the T'an-ching or "Platform Sutra"), one of the great

masterpieces of world spiritual literature (pp. 186-187).

A thousand years later, in Japan, it was Hakuin (1687-1768) whose leadership revived

an intellectual and decadent Rinzai tradition into the vital living Zen that it is today

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throughout the world. Under Hakuin, Koan practice was transformed from intellectual

gamesmanship to its original profundity (p.137 ff).

Soto Zen continues to flourish in Japan and was introduced in the United States in 1958

by the great Zen Master Shunryu Suzuki Roshi (1905-1972), a direct spiritual descendant of

Dogen. His lineage legacy continues today at the Zen Center in San Francisco, California.

Roshi’s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind is among the most profound, and also readable texts in

contemporary spiritual literature.

Zen and Our Primordial Wisdom Tradition

Esoterically, Zen, like all of the esoteric traditions of our Primordial Wisdom Tradition,

transcends its Buddhist origins and conventional Buddhist practice. Whether the pinnacle of

individual enlightenment, or the emptiness Base that is the primordial Tao in whom

everything arises, Zen is indefinable and incomprehensible (fukasetsu), beyond all naming

(namarupa), definition and concept. Zen is "known" only through direct experience. We barely

approach it through language, prose and poetry.

As with Taoism, whose wisdom was assimilated by Ch'an Buddhism before it came to

Japan as Zen, "The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao." Zen that can be described is

not Zen. With the nondual yogas of Dzogchen, Advaita Vedanta and the Christian Gnosis of

Light, Zen is the presence of the primordial perfection or completion, the perfect symmetry

already present within each human form at the spiritual heart (hridyam/kokoro) and within

every form of samsaric experience or existence. Esoterically, Zen is Tao, the direct nondual

presence of that primordial source or nature of mind whose exoteric objects arise therein. Like

Dzogchen, Zen is That (Tathata) nondual primordial wisdom (gnosis/jnana) experienced and

realized by all of the roshis, rishis, saints, sages and mahasiddhas, in all of the world systems

throughout the timeless kosmos. Zen transcends history and its origins. Zen as Tao was

present before the worlds began. Zen as experience began with the first experience of a

sentient being. Zen as conscious awareness began with the first human experience of the

divine. Zen as enlightened experience began with the liberation of the first prehistoric yogi.

Zen will continue as long as sentient beings respond to their transpersonal primordial source.

Therefore, as with the other perennial wisdom traditions—Valentinian Gnostic

Christianity, Advaita Vedanta, Dzogchen— Zen is exoterically (conventional, academic Zen,

Bompu, and "Beat" Zen), a practice for feeling better, or Shojo or Daijo for delivering us from

the state of "ignorance" (avidya) to the "goal" of enlightenment satori. But esoterically, living

Zen is the direct recognition (kensho) and then realization (wu/satori) of that presence of the

supreme source (vertically), and then the compassionate giving (dana) or expression, or

manifestation (horizontally) in the lifeworld of that prior perfection. And this is the nondual

Saijojo Zen.

Shoshin or Zen mind must remain, from the beginning, the beginners mind, the open,

empty, awake mind that includes all possibilities. Shoshin is great doubt. Shoshin is great faith.

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Shoshin is great confidence in the face of doubt. These are the Three Pillars of Zen. Shoshin is

flexible and unfixed, like the mind of a child, like an old man basking in the sun. It does not

attach and defend its ideas, concepts and beliefs, for it has none. Zen mind is our vast original

mind, "Big Mind", compassionate mind. "When our mind is compassionate, it is boundless"

(Suzuki Roshi). The paradoxical ‚goal‛ of Zen practice then is to maintain the nondual

beginner's mind, wu-wei, effortless surrender with no seeking, no goal or "gaining idea."

‚Make the goal the path.‛

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Zen Mind, No-Mind, Buddha Mind: Letting It Be As It Is

The Reformations of Hui-neng and Hakuin

The fifth Ch'an patriarch, Hung-jen (Gunin) was attempting to determine his dharma

successor. He asked his monks to create a poem (gatha) expressing their understanding of

the Buddhadharma. The presumed dharma heir was Shen-hsiu (Jinshu). His gata read:

Our body is the Bodhi tree,

Our mind a Mirror bright;

Carefully we wipe them,

And let no dust alight.

But the novice monk and stable keeper Hui-neng (Eno, 638-713), having seen

Shen-hsiu's gatha, submitted his own:

Bodhi is not a tree;

Nowhere is the mirror bright;

As there is nothing from the beginning,

Where can the dust alight?

Hung-jen immediately understood that, although Shen-hsiu's gatha expressed a deep

but traditional and dualistic understanding of the dharma as transmitted from

Bodhidharma, the twenty-eighth Indian Buddhist patriarch and first Ch’an patriarch.

Hui-neng's understanding transcended the traditional exoteric teaching with its dualism

of experiencing subject and external, separate observed object. The two gathas above

represent the transition from the dualistic to the nondual view in Ch'an Buddhism. Just

so, Ati Dzogchen represents the same transition from the outer tantras to the inner tantras

and ultimately to the subtlest Ati yoga of Dzogchen practice.

The subtle nondual thread which runs through the fabric of our great Primordial Wisdom

Tradition is expressed in many ways. In the Vajrayana tradition of Buddhism we have, in the

highest inner tantra, Dzogchen (Ati yoga), Garab Dorje's statement: "The nature of mind is

Buddha from the beginning." There is no separation between mind (and the objects and

beings arising therein), and Buddha. All is Buddha mind. Everything is Buddha essence or

Buddha Nature (bussho, buddhata, Tathagatagarbha) ‚from the very beginning.‛ ‚From the

beginning, all beings are Buddha‛ (Hakuin). The objects of mind, and the experiencing subject

are at root, identical. They share the same essence or emptiness base. This is the nondual base,

the primordial womb in whom everything arises. So this is the difference between relative

mind, ‚Small Mind,‛ and the nature or essence of mind, ‚Big Mind,‛ that is its absolute or

supreme source, the primordial matrix of all arising objective and subjective phenomenal

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reality. This ontological duality expresses the perennial ‚Two Fundamental Truths‛—

Ultimate Truth, the nondual Source, and all the realities of Relative Truth arising therein.

These Two Truths are in essence an unseparate and inseparable prior unity. Seeing them

thusly, then acting in accordance, is Zen enlightenment.

This nondual Zen understanding—The View—of the Mahayana transcends, includes

and pervades the gradualist, dualistic view of the Sutras, just as the nondual Dzogchen

teaching transcends and includes the dualistic "antidotal" view of the outer tantras (Kriya,

Carya and Yoga), and even of the inner tantras of Mahayoga and Anuyoga. The "higher" or

innermost teaching is superior to the "lesser" yogas not so much qualitatively, but

quantitatively in that the former is more direct, inclusive and less dualistic than the latter,

and therefore more directly and expediently reveals or mirrors the great liberating source.

The Prajnaparamita Sutra of the Mayayana tradition of Buddhism, like the Hinayana

Sutras (and the Gnostic texts) are considered by scholars to be didactic and dualistic. But

within them, particularly the Heart Sutra (Mahaprajna paramita or Hridaya Sutra) and the

Diamond Sutra (Vajrachchedika Sutra), is the profound intuition of the nondual nature of

mind. The great Indian Buddhist master, logician and poet, Nagarjuna (2nd Century) has

interpreted these Sutras in this way. Whether Hui-neng and Hakuin were familiar with

the nondual view of Nagarjuna, what is clear is the nondual understanding of all three of

these great sages.

Hui-neng's essential statement is this: "From the beginning not a thing is. Seeing

into one's self-nature is seeing into emptyness (shunyata)." Hakuin's essential

statement (in the Zazen Wasan) is: "From the beginning all beings are Buddha." This is

the great nondual truth that is transmitted directly from the Dharmakaya through the

historical Nirmanakaya Shakyamuni Buddha and on through the teaching

transmission lineages to all of those with an eye to see.

From emptiness the wondrous being appears. . . no-mind includes

everything. . . even before we practice it, enlightenment is here.

Without any idea of attainment, you are always Buddha.

-Suzuki Roshi (1970)

This great truth (anatman/no-self/dependent origination) is contained in the Hinayana,

Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana dharma teachings (sutra, shastras and tantras) often in a

dualistic representation. It is contained in the expressly nondual view of Ati Yoga

(Dzogchen) and the Anuttara tantras of the Essence Mahamudra of the Vajrayana, in the

nondualism of the Mahayana Saijojo Zen teaching through Hui-neng (Eno) and his

immediate Ch'an dharma successors Ma-tsu (Buso), Nan-chuan (Nansen), Chao-Chou

(Joshu), Huai-hai (Hyakujo), Huang-po (Obaku), Lin-chi (Rinzai), Tung-shan (Tozun),

Ts'ao-shan (Sozun), wu-men (Mumon), and from China to Japan in Esai Zenji (1141-1215,

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Rinzai/Oryo School), and Dogen Zenji (1200-1253, Soto School).

In Japan, a thousand years after Hui-Neng’s reformation of Chinese Ch’an Buddhism,

after a period of intellectual dualism wherein prajna (wisdom) and dhyana

(zazen/meditation) had again become separated, Hakuin Zenji (1685-1768), reformed

Japanese Zen and the nondual practice and expression of Zen was restored.2 Before Hui-

neng became the 6th Ch'an Patriarch, Ch'an Buddhism was essentially Indian dhyana

Buddhism, with its emphasis on the dhyana practice of tso-ch'an (zazen), or sitting

meditation. D.T. Suzuki has termed this the "dust wiping type of meditation" for it

emphasizes the dualistic practice of wiping the dust from the bright mirror of the mind

("keeping watch over purity"), but it cannot transcend the mind to be united with its

primordial, nondual source. The fundamental difference between the passive "quietism"

of the traditional approach of Shen-hsiu and the approach of Hui-neng was in the view of

Buddha Nature (busho). For Hui-neng, Ch'an (Zen) was "seeing into one's original nature"

(self-nature), which is "nothing from the beginning." "Shujo honrai hotoke nari" (all beings

are endowed with Buddha Nature from the beginning). Such a nondual view was a truly

radical idea through which dualistic exoteric Ch'an/Zen Buddhism was freed from the

dualistic view of Indian Hinayana Buddhism.

"We talk of seeing into our own original nature, not of dhyana or of attaining

enlightenment . . . . In self-nature there is from the beginning not a thing that is

attainable" (Hui-neng).

Here is the pith and the gist of Zen. It is not merely the quietism of sitting zazen that

leads to enlightenment—though zazen prepares the mind to open to natural satori—but

truly seeing (kensho, satori), and knowing (wu, gnosis) that one's own original self-nature

is ‚always already‛ liberated, enlightenment itself. This is the immediate recogniton and

ultimate realization. Indeed, clinging or attachment to the peace and bliss of zazen

practice, or the striving or seeking motive (desire) to enlightenment, will effectively

prevent enlightenment. "Remaining naturally in the state (satori, rigpa, vidya) is the

practice." "Nothing special." In the T'an-ching Hui-neng states that "If the view is dualistic

there can be no enlightenment. . . . The truth is understood beyond the mind (hsin, sems,

citta), not by tso-ch'an (zazen) sitting."

This dualism between dhyana (meditation) and prajna (wisdom) which twice stalled

the growth of Ch'an/Zen may be understood thusly: If prajna is awakened only through

the activity of dhyana, then dhyana is prior, thus the two are separate and a dualism exists.

We see into our own true nature, our Buddha Nature which is shunyata (emptiness),

through the illusory objects, concepts, and beliefs of the mind by the illuminating clear

2 Other expressly nondual views (formulations or representations) of the dharma appear in Shankara‟s Advaita

Vedanta, in the Madhyamaka (Middle Way) of Nagarjuna and Chandrakirti, in Valentinian Gnostic Christianity and in

the Taoism of Lao Tsu and Chuang Tsu. Expressly dualistic representations of the dharma teaching are found in the

Buddhist Vaibhashika and Yogachara, in Sankhaya’s separation of Purusha and Prakriti, and the Hindu Yoga systems

of Nayaya, Vaisheshika and Mimamsa, as well as the dualistic exoteric conventional representations of the major

world religions.

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light of prajna. Prajna is the opening to receive the truth of dharma that our true self-nature

is Buddha Nature, then expressing this original nature through compassionate activity in

the world. Thus, seeing into our original nature is ‚leaving it as it is‛ and is just being

That (tatata/suchness/shunyata). Prajna is openness to receive the truth of shunyata. And

dhyana (zazen) is the simultaneous practice, the yoga, the sadhana. But their essence is the

same. No conceptual thought (wu-nien) is involved. The third aspect of this triad is sila

(conduct, morality) which flows from prajna and dhyana. This triad of prajna, dhyana and

sila is analagous to View, Meditation and Conduct in Dogzchen and Mahamudra.

For Hui-neng then, prajna and dhyana are not separate, but identical. Our self-nature

recognizes or realizes itself, its authentic or original nature through directly experiencing

or seeing this great ultimate truth (paramartha), Reality Itself. This seeing (kensho) is prajna.

The dualistic view separates the seeing from That (Tathata) great truth being seen. In Hui-

neng's nondual view, the activity of seeing unites the seer with that seen. Seeing is the

activity of kensho/satori. Prajna is receptivity or opening to it. The reflected objects

appearing through the bright mirror of the mind are transcended in their source, and one

sees that the perceiving self and Reality Itself are identical. There is no separation, no

separate other. There is no dualism. No dilemma. No problem whatsoever. From the

realization of this view, compassionate activity to reduce the suffering of sentient beings

spontaneously arises. Is dhyana prior? Is prajna prior? From the nondual view they are a

prior unity, a relationship of identity.

It is significant in this regard that Hui-neng changed the terminology for "seeing into

the nature of mind" from k'an-ching to chien-hsing. The Chinese character k'an means to

observe from above or from without, as though the observer and that observed were

separate. This is the classical, dualistic, exoteric objectivist view of science and religion in

both the East and the West. Observer and that observed, spiritual aspirant and the goal of

perfect happiness or godhead are viewed as essentially separate. The character for chien

means "to see" or "pure seeing" and does not imply or connote a separation of observer

from that observed, of practitioner from the ‚goal‛ of practice. When combined with

hsing (mind) chien-hsing becomes "essential nature of mind", the direct seeing into it, self-

seeing, not separate observation of it from without. Therefore, seeing something, a

specific object is k'an-ching. Seeing into one's primordial original nature—chien-hsing—is

paradoxically, no-seeing, which arises in "no-mind" (wu-hsin). When seeing has no

reference to an object or condition, that is, when seeing is non-intentional— consciousness

with no intentional object—the pure unconditioned, intuitive realization of the all

inclusive source, it is "no thought" (wu-nien) and no-mind (wu-hsin). This direct, non-

conceptual seeing into one's primordial original nature (chien) is the liberation from

ignorance and suffering that is enlightenment itself (kensho/satori, wu). In the Vajrayana

the self-perfected nature is the presence rigpa (vidya) of the primordial matrix, the ground

or base or source. The Chinese character wu is "my heart-mind," thus it connotes the

emotive (bhakti) "seeing or recognition/ realization of my own essential heart-mind."

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‚Seeing‛ (kensho) is a perceptual-emotional, even devotional process. Hui-neng speaks of

the nondual identity of dhyana and prajna:

What is most fundamental is Dhyana (ting) and Prajna (chin)

. . . do not be deceived that Dhyana and Prajna are separate. They

are one. Dhyana is the body of Prajna, and Prajna is the use

(upaya, means) of Dhyana. . . Dhyana is in Prajna; Prajna is in

Dhyana. . . they are complimentary in practice (sadhana the path)

. . . the view that one must precede the other makes a dualism of

the Dharma.3

For Hui-neng, as for Hakuin, dhyana is not the "quietism" of sitting-only zazen, but the

actions and activity of seeing, hearing, moving, conduct, thinking, eating, sleeping, all of

the activities of a human being. Dhyana is activity (openness) as prajna (wisdom). Prajna

(wisdom) is the harnessing of the primordial prana energy (lung, ch'i) through

meditation expressed and transmitted as compassionate activity (karuna). Prajna

wisdom is dhyana meditation in action. Zazen is bringing the purity and luminosity of no-

mind/Zen mind—the primordial awareness wisdom (Tao, gnosis, jnana, yeshe)—into the

everyday activity of the earth path of compassionate service to oneself and others, indeed,

to all sentient beings. And this is wisdom (prajna). Wisdom and meditation are essentially

the same—two sides of one reality—always a prior unity. Again, the relation is one of

identity. Zazen (meditation)—not merely sitting meditation—is the activity (the action or

conduct) of wisdom. Thus, Hui-neng's great insight created a reformation that opened

Chinese Ch'an Buddhism to the nondual view. Just so, Hakuin accomplished the same

reformation for Japanese Zen Buddhism a thousand years later.

From Ignorance to Bliss: Much Ado About Nothing

The perennial question of spiritual practice is this: How does one move from egoic

ignorance (avidya, marigpa, hamartia/sin) to the bliss of realization? What is the nature of

this transition from Relative Truth of phenomenal reality to the Absolute Truth which

transcends yet contains all truth and all being; from the limited world of the conditional

ego to the enlightenment/samadhi/satori of shunyata emptiness that is Tao. In exoteric

Ch'an and Zen Buddhism the question is one of the transition from mayoi (mi) to satori

(wu); from samasara to nirvana. In the Sanatana Dharma of the Hindu religious complex this

transition from ignorance to happiness is the growing through bindu to ojas. In dualistic

3 Hui-neng, The T’an-ching (Jap. Dan-gyo), The Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch (“Platform Sutra”). Some Scholars

believe that the T’an Ching was written by an unknown author after Hui-neng‟s death. Myths of origin and

interpretation are always inextricably interwoven. Exoterically considered, this is of historial interest. Esoterically, the

truth of the teaching (dharma), when it is the truth, transcends historiographic and hagiological explanation. The truths

of the sutras and tantras remain the truths of the dharma regardless of the specific exoteric origins of that truth.

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pagan and neo-Platonic Gnostic Christianity it is the transition from ignorance or sin

(hamartia) to the nondual Depth (Bathos) in whom arises the fullness of the Pleroma (divine

realm) of Abba, the Primordial Father who is the very Bathos/depth/emptiness. And all of

this through the activity or agency of sophia (relative wisdom) and the gnosis (ultimate

wisdom) that transcends and embraces it. In the esoteric and nondual teaching of all the

traditions ‚The View‛ is the pure seeing (kensho) or realization (satori) that samsara and

nirvana are identical. The polarities of this duality are subsumed in the Primordial

Awareness Wisdom that is nondual jnana/gnosis. With the realization of this through the

stages of meditative stabilization—the accomplishment of shamatha and vipashyana

(joriki)—stabilized, permanent enlightenment may result.

Regarding the nature of this view: Is liberation/enlightenment a sudden, discrete

step-function (tongo), or is it a gradual learning process (zengo, continuity)? It depends on

the View, relative or absolute. Thus it is both.

The alleged debate between Hui-neng (Southern School) and Shen-shiu (Northern

School) that began with the two gathas (p.182), was this: Do we wipe the dust of relative

conditional existence from the bright mirror of the mind, and polish the tile until it

becomes a mirror, and by these purifying activities (zazen) gradually reach

enlightenment, as Shen-shiu argued with his zengo, the gradualist doctrine? Or do we

follow the nondual way of Hui-neng and simply hew wood and carry water and continue

in the gentle activity and compassionate conduct of our daily practice (including zazen),

without any "gaining idea" for enlightenment, confident that our inherent Buddha Nature

is always present within, at the heart, and that in any given moment we may choose to

recognize it. As these brief satoris become a continuity of recognition, liberation and then

Buddhahood may result. Here is Hui-Neng’s eloquent and passionate argument from his

Platform Sutra:

All the Buddhas of the past, present and future, and all the

Sutras (abide) in the self-nature (tsu-hsing) of each one where

they were from the very beginning. . . There is within oneself

that which knows (prajna), and from this source comes

enlightenment (wu). Ignorance arises through thoughts

(concepts) and no one, however wise, can help such a one. But in

enlightenment through prajna all ignorance vanishes in an

instant and the actual self-nature is realized. This realization

may lead to Buddhahood. This state (activity) of prajna-samadhi

is wu-nien (no-thought), or wu-hsin (no-mind).

- Hui-neng, T’an-ching (Yampolsky, 1967)

The path of Hui-neng and the Southern School then, is the path of sudden

enlightenment (tongo), seeing at once, ‚brief moments, many times" the Buddha Nature

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that is always present ‚from the very beginning‛ (This is also the view of the Dzogchen

and Mahamudra of the Vajrayana). Indeed the first Buddhist tongo transmission form

"heart-mind to heart-mind" was that from Shakyamuni Buddha to his great disciple

Mayakashyapa, the first Indian Buddhist patriarch. When the mind is prepared and open

through the practice of the path, one may find oneself suddenly taken up by the

illuminating clear light (kensho/satori/vidya/rigpa), the presence of the very nature or

source of the mind. Here, the dualism of conditional, relative existence is transcended yet

embraced in the nondual ‚primordially pure‛ supreme source, the emptiness (shunyata)

base or matrix in whom all relative existences arise, dwell and return. This is the

enlightenment that ‚may lead to Buddhahood.‛ (For further discussion of the ‚sudden‛

versus ‚gradualist‛ debate, see page p.216.)

Thus, in the expanding continuity—‛brief moments, many times—of true seeing into

one's original self-nature one realizes that this luminous, awake nature of mind is

shunyata, already present from the very beginning. Indeed, that is always our essential

Buddha nature, always abiding at the spiritual heart (hridyam) of each human being.

‚Wonder of wonders, all beings are Buddhas.‛ The apparent need to wipe, polish and

purify our defiled conventional nature in order to realize this essential Buddha nature

was a dualistic illusion based in our unawakened state of ignorance. With the realization

that the clear luminosity of prajna is ontologically prior to ignorance, and that it is truly

our original self-nature as "it was from the very beginning," then indeed, "where can the

dust alight?" Again, this primordial presence (vidya/rigpa) of our actual self-nature is

‚always, already present.‛ We need merely to recognize it. Yet is is veiled by the

obscurations (ignorance/avidya) of Maya. The mind training of the Path gradually removes

this veil so that we can suddenly see (kensho) what is. As we accomplish this in a

continuity of moment to moment kensho/satori through the sadhana of practice in the

company of the master (satsang) and the sanga (fellowship of practitioners) we are

liberated from the obstructive ingorance—negative emotions (desire/attachment,

anger/aggression, ignorance) and satori/ enlightenment is now our ordinary state of mind.

Thus do we accomplish shamatha (mindfulness) and Vapashyana (penetrating insight) and

enter into later bhumi stages of the Bodhisattva’s path to omniscience of perfect

Buddhahood.

Ultimately, we realize that even the bright mirror of the mind is an illusion, or merely

a metaphor for "nowhere is the mirror bright." What is it then, that remains when the

fiery flux of the appearances of mind is blown out? (Nirvana literally means ‚blown out,‛

like a flame). What is to be realized here is the prior unity of the ‚yogi’s great bliss‛

(ananda/mahasuka) with the primordial wisdom (jnana/yeshe/gnosis) of transcendental

prajna-samadhi of no-mind that is our true original nature from the very beginning. This is

sahaj samadhi, the union of bliss and emptiness. Ignorance then, is simply an ignoring or

refusal to recognize our actual identity, the supreme identity that is here now, indwelling,

at the spiritual heart as our original Buddha Nature. Ignorance is hamartia (sin), literally

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"missing the mark" of our primordial original self-nature. Ignorance is avidya-maya, the

power of the ‚concealer truths‛ of relative-conventional reality (‚Small Mind‛) to cloak

(adhyesa) the numinous presence (vidya) of paramartha, the Ultimate Reality (‚Big Mind‛)

that is its very source. Ignorance is avidya (ajnana, marigpa), the dualistic view of confusing

the ego self of the transient phenomenal world of relative, conventional reality with the

unconditional, transcendental self that is no-self, our immediate Zen mind-Buddha mind,

our Buddha Nature (tathgatagarbha) whose very source is shunyata, empty, luminous,

awake, compassionate, nondual intrinsic primordial awareness itself. Again, as this

presence is integrated moment to moment in the lifeworld as self-less prajna-compassion

the result or fruition is Buddhahood—the unity of appearance and emptiness, the unity of

bliss and emptiness—ultimate Happiness Itself (Zen and Dzogchen, p.209 ff).

Wu-Wei

On the Paradox of Seeking

You have always been one with the Buddha, so do not pretend

you can attain this oneness by various practices.

If, in this very instant, you could know that it can never

be attained by effort. . . you would now be the Buddha Mind. . .

Do not seek Buddhahood. Your seeking is doomed to failure.

-Huang Po (Kraft, 1988)

The wu-wei that does not aim at wu-wei, is truly wu-wei.

-Lao Tzu

Let it be, as it is and rest your weary mind. All things are perfect

exactly as they are.

-Shakymuni, The Buddha

Keeping this wu-wei wisdom view of not seeking in mind, we hew wood and carry water,

wipe the dust and polish the tile. Have a cup of tea.

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The Essentials of Zen View and Practice

Bodhidharma’s Four Statements of Zen

“Without past, present or future; empty, awake mind.”

When Bodhidharma arrived in China (circa 521) he found a dualistic Buddhism much

removed from its Zen spirit, either engaged in highly intellectual and speculative

metaphysical philosophy, or trapped in compassionless moral precepts ostensibly passed

down from the Buddha. The essence of Buddhism, the unified practice and expression of

prajna/dhyana/sila (wisdom, meditation, conduct) appeared to be entirely absent. It is this

cultural context in which the great sage transmitted his great Four Statements.45

1. A special transmission outside the orthodox teaching of the

scriptures (kyoge-betsuden)

2. No dependence on sacred writings (furyu-monji)

3. Direct pointing to the heartmind (jikishi-ninshin; kokoro)

4. Seeing into one's original nature, and realization of

Buddhahood (kensho-jobutsu)

The transmission of the Buddhadharma (teaching of the Buddha) through sacred

scriptures (sutras, shastras and tantras) is not sufficient according to Ch'an/Zen, and

requires the direct "heartmind to heartmind" (ishin-denshin denbo) transmission from

master to disciple. The first such transmission of the dharma was from Shakyamuni

Buddha to his dharma successor the great Mahakashyapa, the first Indian Buddhist

Patriarch. Thus, although the sacred writings of the dharma as transmitted through the

sutras, shastras, and tantras are important, they are not sufficient, and must not be

depended upon entirely. First, they must be ‚introduced‛ by direct dharma transmission

from a master.

The Chinese character hsin (Jap. kokoro), usually translated as "mind," or ‚heartmind‛

may also mean "heart, spirit, soul, consciousness, thought," etc. Like such terms in other

4 Some contemporary scholars hold that the Four Statements actually originated much later, with the Ch‟an master

Nan-ch‟uan (Nansen, 745-835), or with Hui-neng. (Eno, 638-713). Hui-neng‟s authorship of the T’an-ching (“Platform

Sutra”) is also in doubt. Indeed, some doubt the historical existence of Bodhidharma altogether. Historically such

questions are of interest. However, esoterically the historical existence of any particular master, including Jesus or

Shakymuni Buddha have no effect on ultimate truth (paramartha) the supreme source shunyata, Tao, Brahman, etc)

that is the Primordial Wisdom Teaching. Primordial awareness Itself – Tao – is the prior base or source of all apparent

phenomenal arising, including the Buddha, dharma and sangha. This supreme source remains unconditional by our

relative thoughts and beliefs about it. Therefore, the truths of this great nondual Primordial Wisdom Teaching are not

conditioned by specific historical incarnations, interpretations or beliefs. “There are many, many ways for the teacher

and the teaching to appear” (Namkai Norbu). 5 Compare these Four Statements of Zen with the Three Statements of Garab Dorje and the Six Vajra Verses of

Vairochana (Chap. II).

191

languages, it has exoteric and esoteric denotations and connotations. In Zen it indicates

spirit or heartmind union with ultimate primordial awareness itself, with our actual

indwelling Buddha Nature (Bussho). Bodhidharma's third statement "Direct pointing to

the heart-mind" has this connotation. This statement is essentially identical to the first

statement of Garab Dorje's Three Statements Which Strike the Essential Point in the Dzogchen

of Vajrayana Buddhism: "Direct transmission of the source of one's original nature‛

(Ch.II).

In the fourth statement, "Seeing into one's original nature" is kensho or satori (seeing

nature, or direct seeing). As this direct seeing is deepened through practice and training

(zazen, koan training and dokusan) it ultimately and in due course becomes the

enlightenment-samadhi of one's inherent Buddha Nature, and may ‚progress‛ to the

profound realization of Buddhahood. The paradox here is, of course, that every sentient

being is "endowed with Buddha Nature from the very beginning," although one who is

not on the path (bonpu-no-joshiki) has little or no awareness of it.

The Five Types of Zen

Early in the ninth century the Ch'an master Kuei-feng (Keiho Zenji, 780-841) of the

Kataku School classified Ch'an (Zen) into five types according to their substance and

purpose. All five utilize the practice of zazen (tso-ch'an), but to different ends. Some are

directed to exoteric, outward, relative-conventional goals, some esoterically, toward

enlightenment, and ultimately, Buddhahood.

It is useful to note that all of the major religious traditions make some use of Zen as

zazen (prayer or contemplative practices). The religions which emphasize dhyana or

mediation (Taoist yoga, the yogas of the Vedas, Upanishads, Vedanta and other Hindu

religions utilize zazen (sitting meditation) to a greater degree than Islam or Christianity.

Yet the esoteric stream of these latter two also emphasize meditative prayer and

contemplation (the Sufis and Valentinian Gnostics).

1. Bompu Zen (Bonpu, or "ordinary" Zen): Zen practice without the motive or intention to

liberation, for physical and mental well-being, relaxation, or stress management. Bompu

does not address the dualistic mass-mind delusion that humanity and Buddha Nature,

matter and spirit, are separate. Bonpo does not speak to the truth that the Buddha Nature

and humanity are an unseparate prior unity.

2. Gedo Zen (the "outside way"): Religious teachings outside the Buddhist context. The

contemplative practices of Christianity, Islam, Confucianism, Shinto, Jainism, the Hindu Yoga

Systems including Vedanta and others. Gedo also includes meditative practices (joriki) pursued

to gain "supernatural" powers (siddhis), or to be reborn in some "heaven."

3. Shojo Zen (Lesser Vehicle, Hinayana Buddhism): Zen practice the motive of which is

Arhathood, or enlightenment for oneself only, which differs from the Mayayana ideal of

the Bodhisattva whose intention is to continue upon the cycle (wheel of samsara) of death

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and rebirth for the sake of aiding the enlightenment of all sentient beings. The goal of

Shojo may be the condition of Mushinjo (blank Zen) where the senses and ordinary

consciousness are ceased. If Mushinjo is maintained at death, it is said that the adept

escapes rebirth in samsara.

4. Daijo Zen (Greater Vehicle, Mahayana Buddhism): The purpose of Daijo is

enlightenment, the seeing into one's original nature (kensho, satori) and realizing the

Mayayana Way in the everyday life-world (mujodo-no-taigen). Here zazen becomes more

than a means to a goal, but is the actual realization of the Buddha Nature (Buddha mind)

that lives within each human form and indeed, within all sentient beings. Here the

Bodhisattva ideal is active. The practitioner vows to continue on the wheel of death and

rebirth until all sentient beings are enlightened.

5. Saijojo Zen (Highest or Supreme Vehicle): The great nondual transcendental Zen

practice of all of the Buddhas in all worlds, throughout all time. Analogous to Dzogchen

(Ati Yoga) or the Essence Mahamudra of the Inner Tantras (Anuttara tantras) of the

Vajrayana (Diamond Vehicle). Here there is no gaining motive to enlightenment although

the Bodhisattva ideal is present. The practice of the path becomes the goal. ‚Make the

goal the path.‛ Both Rinzai and Soto Zen utilize Daijo and Saijojo. Rinzai places emphasis

on koan practice. Soto places emphasis on the shikantaza (shamatha-vipashyana) zazen

practice of Dogen Zenji. Mujodo no traigen is the actualization of Saijojo Zen with

meditative stabilization—samadhi–and its spontaneously arising ‚wisdom of kindness,‛

compassionate activity in the everyday lifeworld.

Kuei-feng's classification is useful today within the context of Buddhist Zen.

Esoterically considered however, the truths of Zen and zazen are the truths of our great

Primordial Wisdom Tradition and obtain throughout all of the religious and

philosophical traditions of Humankind. Yet, throughout this Great Tradition one finds at

both the pinnacle and the base of each individual tradition a nondual ‚highest‛ or

subtlest teaching and practice, the ‚perfect practice‛ for the prepared devotee working

with a qualaified master. This subtlest level of practice may lead directly to liberation/

enlightenment. In the Mahayana tradition this subtle nondual practice is Saijojo Zen and

the Madhyamaka of the Definitive Meaning. In the Vajrayana tradition it is Dzogchen

(Nyingma) and Essence Mahamudra (Kagu). In the Hindu tradition it is the Advaita Vedanta

of the great Shankara. In the Taoist tradition it is the Yoga of the Returning of the Light.

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The Five Levels of the Zen Path

It is wise for the student and the teacher to periodically, authentically discuss

(dokusan) the aspiration level of the student. In Zen, as in other "spiritual" practice,

aspiration arises in five levels or classes. The student's meditation practice will be specific

to the level of aspiration. Yasutani Roshi describes five levels.

Level one: The student has no prior experience in any meditative discipline. Level

two: The student desires to enhance psycho-physical and emotional well-being; to learn

to "relax," or to address some specific emotional or somatic complaint. Level three: The

student has experienced some truth of the dharma through prior meditative, prayer,

study, or religious experience and desires to continue this growth. The student is free of

substance addictions and primary neurotic behaviors and demonstrates some degree of

individual responsibility in the lifeworld. Level four: The student has experienced basic

to profound insight into his/her original nature and actual place in reality; has established

stability and responsibility in the lifeworld; has demonstrated and integrated prior

meditative and "spiritual" experience, wisdom, and compassion; has an understanding of

the activity of the ego and a moderate to intense desire for the highest realization; has a

benign, humble and open mind and heart to the teacher or master and to the past and

future dharma. Level five: The student has committed his/her life to the realization of

Buddha mind and is beginning to manifest meditative stability and liberation—

enlightenment in the lifeworld.

The practice to which the "student" and the "teacher/master" commit (covenant/

samaya) on the student's behalf is dictated by the stated and demonstrated aspiration level

of the student in the present lifeworld.

Yasutani Roshi's Three Pillars of Zen6

1. Strong Faith (daishinkon): In Zen practice, faith must run deeper than mere concept

and belief. It is a profound and unshakable faith anchored in the Buddha's enlightenment,

but also in the entire tradition of enlightened Buddhas and masters in all world systems

throughout all time.

2. Strong Doubt (daigidan): Doubt is the other side of faith. Strong doubt arises from

strong faith, just as every pole of a dualism dialectically gives rise to its opposite. Why

does the world appear to be so full of suffering and death, when our faith in the dharma

teaches us that the opposite is true? Faith is directly proportional to doubt. Dialectically,

the pole of every dualism, every dilemma changes to its opposite (death/life, dark/light,

negative/positive) and back again. Just so, doubt becomes faith, faith becomes doubt, and

this hectic cycle yields the resolve to continue, all the way to the end of it.

3. Strong Determination (dai-funshi): From strong faith and strong doubt arises the

6 Yasutani Roshi, from Philip Kapleau‟s The Three Pillars of Zen, 1980.

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desire and determination to reconcile the psychic tension (cognitive dissonance) between

the two. In this spiritual dialectic, we naturally strive for cognitive and spiritual

equilibrium (wholeness). The greater our commitment to the process, the greater our

determination to balance, then resolve the apparent dualism of the wisdom/prajna/ jnana

and compassion of enlightenment (nirvana), with the ignorance (avidya) and its suffering

in the dualistic world of samsara. In Daijo it is doubt and fear of rebirth that is the motive

to enlightenment. In Saijojo it is the profound faith in the knowledge which becomes the

direct experience (wisdom) that all beings are inherently Buddha, which motivates and

directs us forward in practice. There should be no urgent seeking after enlightenment. In

faith and/or doubt we sit, walk and practice moment to moment in our everyday lives

with knowing awareness and great confidence, beyond the dualism of faith and doubt,

that our inherent Buddha Nature, our actual self-nature is always present at the heart. We

return to this view, this "posture", this "seat", even when we forget. Shashaku jushaku, just

continue in error. Here, ‛brief moments, many times,‛ is the presence (rigpa, vidya), then

the distraction (ma rigpa, avidya), then the presence, all day, all night, until the presence of

the nondual supreme source is integrated and stabilized (mujodo-no taigen) in the

everyday lifeworld.

The Three Aims of Zazen7

These three aims form an inseparable prior unity. Over-emphasis or neglect of any

area is counter productive or dangerous.

1. Joriki: Development of the power of mindfulness (shamatha), and one-pointed

concentration through penetrating insight practice (zazen/shikantaza). If joriki is not

constantly expanded by kensho and satori, it fades and may be lost, or misused.

2. Kensho/Satori: The practice of joriki, when combined with other aspects of Zen

practice (teisho, dokusan) leads naturally to satori awakening or seeing into our actual

original nature, which is seeing the ultimate essence or nature of mind and the kosmos.

Kensho/satori is the prajna-wisdom-compassion that arises out of joriki. Ultimately satori

awakening, when practiced moment-to-moment may result in liberation-enlightenment,

and even Buddhahood.

3. Mujodo no taigen: Potentially, the actualization of Saijojo, the nondual Supreme Zen

Vehicle, is the continuity of stabilizing (samadhi) of the great nondual practice through

kind, compassionate conduct in the everyday lifeworld. This is the highest or most direct

nondual yoga of Zen practice. It corresponds to 6th stage (or even 7th stage) practice in

the Seven Stages of Life (Appendix A). At this lifestage the ego and all dualism is

transcended in its nondual source and the ultimate realization that "I Am Buddha," "That

I Am" (Tat Tvam Ami), "I and the Father are one" is integrated into the aspirant’s

lifeworld. When kensho/satori is fully manifested and demonstrated in all activity and

7 Yasutani Roshi (in Kapleau), Three Pillars (1980)

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action, on a moment-to-moment basis, this is the perfect enlightenment of the perfect

practice (samyak-sambodhi). This is the practice that may result in Buddahood, the perfect

enlightenment of a Buddha.

Yasutani's Roshi's caution to us regarding certain trends in contemporary Zen

practice warrants careful consideration:

The Rinzai sect tends to make satori-awakening the final aim of sitting

(zazen meditation)and skims over joriki and mujodo no taigen. Thus the

need for continued practice after enlightenment is minimized, and koan

study, since it is unsupported by zazen and scarcely related to daily

life, becomes essentially an intellectual game. . . . The Soto sect stresses

mujudo no taigen, little more than an accumulation of joriki which

recedes and disappears unless zazen is [practiced] . . . The contention

of the Soto sect nowadays that kensho is unnecessary . . . is specious, for

without kensho you can never really know what the Buddha-mind is.8

A teaching that does not arouse a defense of one’s comfort

zones, is not a useful teaching.

Dogen Zenji (Author’s Translation)

8 Yasutani Roshi, in Kapleau‟s Three Pillars of Zen (1980)

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The Zen of Spiritual Materialism: Pride is the Rub

Meditators and non-meditators alike have a pronounced egoic resistance to the

growth changes induced through meditation. However, once the practice begins and

stabilizes under the guidance of a master, the profound relief and release from the

stresses and confusion of everyday conditional existence can, at more ‚advanced‛ stages,

lead to a counter-productive attachment or clinging to the peaceful practice of

mindfulness (shamatha) that results in a kind of "comfort zone." This "zone" is not difficult

to understand. Volumes of research have proven the benefits of meditation in increased

health, well being and fuller functioning in the lifeworld of the meditator. As one learns

the tranquility or equinimity that ‚tames the wild horse of the mind,‛ or even before, one

naturally moves through, and relaxes and releases psycho-emotional obstructions and

obscurations to clear seeing presented by one's conscious and unconscious egoic

attachments and defenses. This leads to ever subtler and more profound emotional-

spiritual growth as well as "personal power." Indeed, one begins to acquire certain

"spiritual" capital and status. Thus the clinging or attachment to the egoic "spiritual"

comfort zone. Chogyam Trungpa has called this subtle egoic trap "spiritual materialism".

It is an "evolved" state of dualism (life stages 1 through 6, Appendix A) and may be a

very seductive and destructive prison. Its cause is pride. Egoic pride is the most subtle,

most insidious of the obscurations to realization that arise on the path.

It is the inherent responsibility of such an individual and his/her teacher and/or

master to move through or beyond, or to transcend this plateau so that growth may

continue. The process, by its nature, evolves or ascends to ever subtler or "higher," or

more interior levels (mansions or dimensions). All of this is well and good. Yet, if the

aspirant/student, or the teacher, misses the point that "higher" spiritual growth (not

necessarily conventional, psychological emotional growth) is retarded by any "gaining

idea" or egoic motive—even a great or noble motive—great developmental harm may

result. One of the perennial truths regarding spiritual growth is wu-wei, surrender of the

seeking motive, effortless, non-goal directed action that is non-action. "Be here now."

Spiritual striving and seeking betray the destination. The goal is the path, today, now.

‚Make the goal the path.‛ Thus seeking and clinging attachment to the positive results of

meditation, deep prayer or zazen paradoxically retards growth. The pride that is the

"spiritualized" ego is one of the most subtle and dangerous non-entities on the path of

growth to wholeness and liberation-enlightenment. The ego desires its goal of liberation

from the suffering of ego. "Desire is the creator and destroyer of worlds." The great

paradox of "spiritual" growth is that it requires an intense desire - motivation to proceed.

Yet this very desire yields the egoic intention, the "gaining idea" which inhibits further

growth. Due to the subtlety of the ego's defenses, the student needs a qualified master.

The ego—spiritual pride—is always a false guru. In Buddhism it is told that egoic pride—

spiritual or otherwise—is the cause of the suffering of cyclic existence.

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The Logic of Reality: East Meets West

Esoterically considered, Zen, as the Primordial Awareness Wisdom is the heartmind

essence of religion, philosophy and science. The ultimate meaning of philosophy is the

union of love (philos) and wisdom (sophia). The root meaning of ‚religion‛ (religio) in the

Indic Sanskrit of our Indo-European etymological tradition is ‚yoga,‛ union, the linking

or binding together—yin/yang, outer/inner, true/false, spirit/matter—of the opposites of

dualistic reality. In the Greek this unifying force is zygon. The process of the dualistic,

relative mind and its painful egoic resistance to healing these splits must be felt through,

and ultimately transcended in the realization of its nondual supreme source. This seeking

motive, this desire for the supreme happiness that is the realization of ultimate truth,

whether pre-conscious, conscious, or super-conscious, is at the heart of the quests of

science, religion and philosophy. Indeed, this motive, this primordial impulse, is the root

of all of our seeking strategies.

Both science and philosophy are grounded in certain metaphysical assumptions as to the

objective, physical nature of reality (Chap.VII). The metaphysical base of exoteric science (both

physical and psychological) and of speculative philosophy (epistemology, metaphysics,

aesthetics, ethical theory) is grounded in or presupposes that metaphysical, ultimate

primordial ground that transcends yet includes it. How can this be? Zen (Tao) is this prior

nondual unity of subjective observer and object observed and measured. Zen is the supreme

source, the matrix or base of the mind in whom religion, philosophy, science, culture and

everything else arises, and into whom this all returns. Yet Zen, as zazen is also the way or

method or practice (the path) opening into the realization of this great truth of our Primordial

Wisdom Tradition. Thus Zen (and Dzogchen and Mahamudra) is the ultimate nondual

openness, the unbroken wholeness that is the primordial awareness base (Ultimate

Truth/paramartha), ‚Big Mind‛ in whom all relative conventional spacetime reality (Relative

Truth/samvriti), ‚Small Mind‛ arises and participates. These are the ‚Two Truths‛ of our

perennial wisdom tradition. Zen is also the path, the non-seeking, non-action way (wu-wei) of

simply letting Being be. ‚The wu-wei that does not aim at wu-wei is truly wu-wei.... Tao (Zen)

does nothing, yet nothing is left undone‛ (Lao Tzu).

The perceiving, discursive thinking mind, ‚Small Mind,‛ in its intellectual effort to grasp

and to understand the vast expanse of its nondual source—the very Nature of Mind (Big

Mind)—encounters dualism and dilemma at every discrete point. Thinking is a two-valued,

truth-functional (true-false, this or that) binary cognitive operation. Language expresses

thinking and follows the basic laws of thought, the logical structure of syntax. These laws

have been utilized in both the Orient and the Occident for at least twenty-four hundred years.

The "Four Propositions" of Nyaya Indian logic (catushkotika) and Aristotle's "Three Laws of

Thought" express Eastern and Western views of the logic of the thinking or discursive mind.

To better understand the Two Truths and Buddhist dependent arising (pratitya samutpada) and

the strategy and use of paradox in Zen, and especially koan practice in the transcendence of

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dualistic egoic view and experience, let us now briefly digress into the logical syntax of

human language and thought.

The Laws of Thought in the West: Aristotle

The Occidental view is expressed in Aristotle's Three Laws of Thought and is the

foundation of formal logic and mathematics, and of the Western rationalist, realist-

materialist world view.

1. The Law of Identity: A is A. What is, by definition, is.

2. The Law of Contradiction: A is not not-A (contradictories cannot

both be true).

3. The Law of Excluded Middle (tertium non datur): Everything is

either A or not-A (contradictories cannot both be false).

Thus, the Law of Contradiction and the Law of Excluded Middle are deduced from

the definition of contradictories as stated in the Law of Contradiction. The European

Intuitionists and Hindu and Buddhist logicians deny the Law of Excluded Middle. The

meaning of logico-mathematical entities or constructs is derived from their prior base (is

dependent upon their construction). Therefore, according to the Eastern view, the truth of a

particular statement (proposition) is not logically equivalent to the falsity of its

contradictory. Therefore, it is not necessarily true that ‚Everything is either A or not A.‛

Apparent contradictions may both have truth value, that is, ‚Both A and not-A‛ (the Law

of Connection), or neither A nor not-A (the fourth law of Eastern logic, p.199). These laws

permit the ontological interdependence of all arising phenomena, eg. The Buddhist

Dependent Arising (pratitya samutpada), and do not presuppose the existence of A.

In the West, Akos von Pauler (supported theoretically by the Phenomenologists L.E.J.

Brouwer, Hegel, Whitehead, Husserl and others) added this fourth law, the Law of

Connection ("Everything is connected with all other things") to Aristotle’s Three Laws.

The principles of deductive and inductive reasoning are derived from these primary

Laws of Thought.

The laws of Sufficient Reason, Classification, Correlatively, and the Scholastic Dictum

de omini et nullo, (misleadingly called "Aristotle's Law"), the principle of "everything and

nothing," are all recent developments to Aristotle’s Three Laws and aid in the emerging

rapproachment of the logic of East and West.

The Dictum de omini et nullo is the precursor to modern set theory and states that

what is universally asserted or denied of a class (or relation) is asserted or denied of

everything that is included within that class (or relation). The Principle of Classification

asserts that everything that is, can be classified; and the Principle of Correlatively asserts

that all relative phenomena are subsumed in the Ultimate or the Absolute. This is the

Western version of the universal principle of ‚The Two Truths,‛ that Ultimate or

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Absolute Truth (paramartha) subsumes or transcends, yet includes Relative Truth

(samvriti). The Principle of Sufficient Reason states approximately that every effect has a

cause (the Causal Principle), from which the physical laws of motion (change) are

derived. The proper method of philosophical and metaphysical inquiry, according to the

Intuitionists and to Ludwig Wittgenstein, is "reduction", the discovery of the assumptions

underlying, or prior to, our logical, speculative reasoning or thinking about this

phenomenal reality that appears.

The Eastern Mind

In the Oriental tradition, especially in the Hindu, Indian and Tibetan logical systems9

formal logic closely parallels Western logic. That the categories of reason should be so

similar in cultures with widely disparate world views may be explained, in part, by the

fact that the pre-verbal cognitive base from which both the Eastern and Western thought

and language systems have arisen is the shared prehistoric and historical Indo-European

consciousness with its bent toward objectivity. The logical structure of the syntax of these

systems is similar because the experiential consciousness base is essentially the same. But

this similarity points to a more ultimate connection. All beings, indeed all existence share

the same great primordial awareness consciousness base. Esoterically, we all share the

same origin or source. Thus our cognition—our cognitive structures and functions—are

shared. For the religious consciousness, we all share and participate in the same godhead.

We just experience and describe it a little differently. The urgent inclusion of of the Law

of Connection—the Fourth Law—into the Western logical canon now parallels the

essential Four Propositions of Nyaya in the Vedic-Vedanta and Buddhist traditions:

1. It is A.

2. It is not-A

3. It is both A and not-A (the Law of Connection)

4. It is neither A nor not-A (neti, neti: not this, not this)

If we compare the third law of each tradition we see that the excluded middle

("everything is either A or not-A") of the Western canon may be replaced by the Eastern

Law of Connection, "It is both A and not-A", which is the complimentary to the fourth

law of the Oriental tradition, "It is neither A nor not-A." These two considered together

express the logical, epistemological and ontological uncertainty of the Quantum Theory,

and of the paradoxical truth of Zen/Tao: ‚It is both this and that;‛ therefore, ‚it is neither

this nor that‛ (neti, neti). Therefore it may be non-existent or empty of any essential,

inherent existence (emptiness/ shunyata). Everything arises from Tao / emptiness, and

returns again to emptiness. Indeed, this apparent arising and return are an atemporal 9 Not surprisingly, ancient China, under the practical, moral and mystical influences of Taoism, Confusianism and

Ch‟an Buddhism showed little interest in formal logic.

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unity. Relative spacetime phenomenal existence (samvriti) is never ever actually separate

from the primordial state of union with the perfectly subjective Base of reality that is

Ultimate Truth (paramartha). This coalescence of the Two Truths of our Great Wisdom

Tradition is thus, always a non-conceptual prior unity. There is one truth viewed as two

modes, through two lenses. However, ultimately, not even this assertion can be made

because, as we have seen, all assertions—Eastern or Western—are relative concepts.

Ultimately, truth can only be realized through the pre-conceptual post-critical, ‚pristine

cognition‛ (dharmadhatujnana, chos-ying yeshe), the primordial awareness wisdom (jnana,

yeshe) of Absolute Reality. This ‚Buddha mind‛ is liberation from the limits of the logical

mind. And this realization is the liberation from ignorance that is enlightenment, ultimate

‚Happiness Itself.‛

This Law of Connection correlates the tautological, truth-functional (true-false)

dualism of the other logical laws with the metaphysical necessity of the transcendent

base, the sourceground that transcends yet embraces the entire dimension of relative

truth, including the highly emotional, logical thinking mind. Theologians, philosophers,

and scientists have often referred to this metaphysical Base as the ‚First Cause.”

Physicists call it the "Big Bang." For the religious mind it is the Creator God. This primal

cause begins the linear chain of cause and effect—the arrow of time, from particles to

stars to life—that is the primary assumption of the "Principal of Causality‛, the basis of

our classical scientific and common sense assumptions about reality. This primordial

creation event marks the beginning of the transition from monistic

Pythagorean/Parmenidean perfectly subjective “Being”—the changeless primordial Base

that is ‛Reality Itself‛—to the Heraclitean flux of arising energy/motion that is

‚Becoming‛ objective spacetime reality. Primal, absolute nondual being is always

becoming its relative spacetime particulars. That is its nature. However, the

Cartesian/Newtonian concept of an absolute objective causality and an absolute objective

time in which it occurs, has been recently demolished by the Quantum Theory (the

Uncertainty and Complimentarity Principles, Chap. I). This classical causality with its

linear First Cause is also denied by the Buddhist view of causality, dependent origination

(pratitya samutpada).

Thus, the profound intuition—the impulse—of our primordial sourceground appears

in all its traditions and manifestations. The masters of the three times have told it: this

utterly ineffable ‚supreme source‛ abides at the root of attention, just beyond the logic of

conceptual mind. Yet human reason may approach it, and contemplative practice may

reveal it, not conceptually or logically, but directly, through the senses and the heart.

Shunyata then, is realized as the affirming luminous emptiness by the ‚pristine

cognition‛ of our nondual innate ‚primordial awareness wisdom‛ (jnana, gnosis). The

objects arising from this emptiness Base are entirely devoid of any ultimate essential

intrinsic existence. Yet through this dependent arising appears the often all too real world

of relative spacetime reality, including us, and our rational, logical effort to understand it

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all. Vidya/rigpa is the always present ‚presence‛ of this innate nondual wisdom, this vast

emptiness Base that we are. And this realization waits, awake within each individual

heartmind (kokoro/anjin/hridyam) as we indulge our seeking strategies, our paradoxical

ceaseless search for logical certainty, and for the realization of the indwelling happiness

that cannot be lost. So it is told by the highest teachings of our Great Wisdom Tradition.

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Who Is It?

From Koan to Zen Mind

It is the seeing into this entire process of self-transcendence (self-forgetting) in the

primordial source that the logic of koan practice is designed to facilitate and ultimately

realize. The essence of koan is paradox (Greek: beyond thinking). The purpose of Koan is

zygon or yoga, (linking, binding together) the unifying of the opposites of dualistic reality.

Paradox transcends the logical, conceptual mind which obstructs the recognition of the

actual unity. The paradox of the koan, when engaged with all of the concentration of

one's being, and all of the force of one's practice, in due course and by grace, cuts

through, with the double-edged sword of Manjusri (the Bodhisattva of Wisdom), the

dualistic conceptual baggage of the narcissistic, discursive thinking mind. At the instant

of the cutting, the koan is resolved and a profound nondual enlightenment occurs. Such

an enlightenment, as it grows through continued practice, may lead to Buddhahood. The

term "nondual" is more precise than "union" for the latter implies an initial condition of a

dualism to be unified, whereas the former implies no separation from the very beginning.

The function of the koan is to demonstrate to the practitioner the trap that is egoic

conceptual mind in which we live. When an assertion or a denial is made we become

trapped in the net of one of the logical Laws of Thought. By taking an opinion, or a

conceptual or belief position, whether consciously or unconsciously, we have polarized

our thinking and thereby our identity becomes bound to that pole. This leads to the egoic

need to defend our position (cognitive dissonance). Thus we become the advocates of our

present lifestage developmental limits. This is the dualism of opposites, and the reason

the Buddha stated that he held no opinions. For Zen, the truth lies not in one pole or the

other of a dichotomy—concept, opinion, or belief—but in the middle, at the zero axis

between the poles of positive and negative, without choosing a position. It is this seeing

from all perspectives that is the essence of the "supreme way of seeing," "The Middle

Way" (Madhyama-pratipad) of the Buddhist Madhymaka view of Nagarjuna. In ‚meditative

stablization‛, when our identity is firmly established here, we will not be seduced by the

dualistic mind into the trap of true or false, right or wrong, good or evil, self or not-self.10

This mean or middle way of our great Primordial Wisdom Tradition is the grand

dialectical resolution of the extreme views of eternalism (belief in a permanent intrinsic

reality) and nihilism (denial of any reality). This middle way is the higher wisdom

synthesis that is the prior primordial unity of Ultimate Truth (paramartha) with the

‚concealer truths‛ (samvriti), all of the illusory subject-object dualities of the world of

Relative Truth. This synthesis is the samadhi of realization that is, in this dialectical

10

Of course perceptual and conceptual dualism (sensation and thought) continues to arise and one continues to observe

and to use them in the everyday lifeworld. The difference is in the view. Dualism is witnessed as it arises but is not

given identity. Thoughts are allowed to “self-liberate” at the moment of their arising. The poles of dilemma are

experienced (nyam), yet not attached to. Identity “remains naturally” in our original nature, the satori of the emptiness

of no-Self that arises from and returns to emptiness (shunyata).

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process, the thesis of our next level of realization, all the way to the full bodhi of

Buddhahood.

Thus, in the cognitive operations of the dualistic thinking mind the logical Laws of

Thought are dialectical. One pole or position always changes to its opposite. An assertion

can always be denied. Any thesis can be deconstructed to reveal its inherent contradictions.

Our current satori of understanding is but a stage level for a deeper or subtler synthesis

toward the ultimate realization of the numinous unbounded whole. Therefore, thesis

becomes antithesis yielding a higher level synthesis which becomes the new thesis.

Culturally, the dominant world-view or scientific or philosophical position of a society (or

an individual), eventually may become its opposite. This dialectical pendulum moves

forward and back, again and again in the history of ideas, and in the personal history of

each individual.

Shall we then avoid thinking and conceptual activity altogether? No. The separative

processes of the ego and its destructive dualistic thinking mind are an inevitable part of the

whole process. This process cannot be successfully denied, suppressed or repressed. It must

be used to serve an out-growing or a growing beyond. It is not ideation or thinking itself, but

the attachment to beliefs, concepts and ideas (wu-li) that is the rub. Indeed, it is our habitual

clinging to the process of thinking, evidenced in our inability to stop it, that prevents us from

directly experiencing the presence of our nondual source that lives just beyond it, that

transcends it and in whom it all arises, dwells and passes away.

When the radical truth of the primordial nondual mind nature or mind essence is

realized, the dilemma of the alternatives or positions or poles of true/false, self/not-self,

matter/spirit is resolved. The Ultimate Truth can neither be asserted nor negated. So long

as one persists in assertions, negations, denials, contradictions, there is some "trace" of

concept, of speculative or metaphysical thinking. Koan practice discourages this. The

"Mu" koan, properly engaged, eliminates it.

"What is the Buddha?" "When you seek the Buddha, you cannot see him. Therefore

the Buddha is the Buddha." "What is the Tao?" "The Tao is the Tao. The musk melon is

sweet, even to the stems; the bitter gourd is bitter, even to the roots." (Goso). "The Tao

that can be named is not the eternal Tao" (Tao Te Ching of Lao Tsu).

Zen is just the ordinary. Nothing special (wu shin). Nothing wonderful, speculative,

metaphysical or philosophical. When you're hungry, you eat. When you're tired, you

sleep. When you’re insulted, you forget. Yet primordial awareness is always present. The

continuum of recognition of this—moment-to-moment—is shoshin (sho, essence, shin

heartmind), the beginner's mind. Zen is ordinary because everything is Buddha mind.

Zen does not indulge too long, nor attach to any philosophy or religious belief. As with

Dzogchen, Zen is not a friend of exoteric organized religion, nor of any spiritual dogma—

outer, inner, or secret. Dogen said, "To study Buddhism is to study ourselves. To study

ourselves is to forget ourselves." When we forget ourselves, what remains present is the

numinous presence—beyond belief—as nondual pure awareness (vidya/rigpa). This is the

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essence of the Socratic/Platonic dictum, "To thine own self be true."

When we forget ourselves, we actually are the true

activity of reality itself. When we realize this fact,

there is no problem whatsoever in this world.

- Szuki Roshi, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind (1970)

We are so addicted to conceptual thinking (wu-li) that to "just see" reality as it is

directly given (kensho), prior to its capture and interpretation by the reticulum of the

thinking mind, is not possible without training. Zazen (shikantaza), teigo, dokusan and koan

practice are designed to bring ‚the mind-forg’d manacles‛ (Blake) of conceptual thought

into chaos and crisis. The koan is a yoga. The koan is a vector. It points to the

uncomforable limits of discursive conceptual mind, and beyond to kensho/satori, luminous

clarity which transcends yet embraces it. Here is Hui-neng's penetrating description of

the koan crisis:

If you want to get to the pure truth of egolessness, you must

let go your hold (wu-li) and fall over the precipice. When you

rise again (you are) newly awakened and in full possession of

the four virtues of eternity, bliss, freedom and purity which

belong to the true Self . . . All of a sudden one finds the mind

and body blown out of existence (like a flame), together with

the koan. . . . It is like death itself. Then your awakening will

be a joy inexpressible.

- Hui-neng, in Zen Buddhism, D.T. Suzuki (1949)

The koan crisis expresses a great truth of our radical nondual Primordial Wisdom

Tradition: The ego-self must die and be born again as wisdom for the indwelling,

inherent Christ-Buddha Nature to be realized.

Mu! : The Crux of the Matter

In Mumon's (Wu-men, 1183-1260) The Mumonkan (The Gateless Barrier, 1229) there are

forty eight koans. The first and most widely used is the famous Mu Koan (brought to

Japan by Kakushin in 1256). Students of Zen have wrestled with it for eight hundred

years. It is still used in Rinzai, and even in Soto Zen to this day.

The power of the Mu koan lies in its radically nondual, non-speculative nature. Other

koans engage the conceptual mind with the purpose of leading it to the edge. Mu, by its

nature, transcends the limits of the dualistic logic of the conceptual mind from the very

beginning. There is no logical or rational solution (fukasetsu) to the Mu koan. As Marcel

Duchamps said regarding the apparent "problem of perception," "If there is no solution,

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then perhaps, there is no problem."

Here is Mumon's Mu Koan with his commentary.

A monk in all seriousness asked Jushu: "Has a dog Buddha-

nature or not?" Joshu retorted "Mu!" In the practice of Zen you

must pass through the barrier-gate set up by the Patriarchs. To

realize enlightenment you must look into the source of your

thoughts, thereby annihilating them. The barrier is Mu, the

barrier of the supreme teaching. Ultimately, it is a barrier that

is no barrier. One who has passed through it can walk hand in

hand with the whole line of Patriarchs.

- Yasutani Roshi trans., in Kapleau (1980)

The wato (key point) of the Mu Koan is "Mu!" The engagement is with Mu! Mu/Wu is

the vast perfectly ineffable essence and nature of Tao. It is variously translated as

emptiness, silence, non-being, satori, liberation/enlightenment, nothing, nothingness, is

not, has not, etc. Mu is the nondual Nature of Mind—mind essence—our actual identity.

Yet Mu is none of this. For all of this is merely ideational conceptual self-stimulation.

Indeed, to the relative-conventional mind,a most unusual paradox.

We have seen that the essential nature of all existence is that it has the potential of Buddha

Nature. Does everything have Buddha Nature then, or not? If so, how or where shall we find it?

Dogen's interpretation of the Nirvana Sutra is that all sentient beings already are Buddha

Nature, not that they possess some quality called Buddha Nature. Everything already is

"Buddha from the beginning." That is its essential nature, and actual identity. All arising

relative, conditional existence participates in this ‚Big Mind,‛ is already Buddha mind. The

motion of prana or energy (change), of the Law of Karma, (reaping what is sown, the Law of

Cause and Effect) arises from, dwells, and returns again to its great primordial source. This

source is shunyata (emptiness, wu, mu, ku), the matrix of all objective material and subjective

immaterial (form and formless) phenomenal reality. "Life includes both existence and non-

existence. . . existence comes from emptiness and goes back again into emptiness (shunyata). We

have to go through the gate of emptiness . . . . When we realize that everything we see is a part

of emptiness, we can have no attachment to any existence, everything is just a tentative form

and color" (Suzuki Roshi, 1970)

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We are the manifestation of our karmic action/effect relations

at any given moment, and upon their modification we change

accordingly. What we call life is no more than a procession of

transformations. If we do not change we are lifeless. We grow

and age because we are alive. We die because we are alive.

Creation and destruction signify life. When you truly

understand this fundamental principle you will not be anxious

about your life or your death. You will then attain a steadfast

mind and be happy in your daily life.

-Yasutani Roshi, in Kapleau (1980)

The Buddha said, "What you are is what you have been; what you will be is what

you do now. . . See Buddha Nature in all the various beings, and in every one of us."

"Has a dog Buddha Nature or not?" Yasutani Roshi explains that the question is not

about "has" or "has not."

"Mu has nothing to do with the existence or non-existence of

Buddha-nature, but is itself Buddha-nature. Mu! thrusts

Buddha Nature before us. . . There is no barrier. Everything

being Buddha-nature, there is no gate through which to go in

or out."

Mu is the gateless gate. Mu is the yogic vehicle for the transcendence of our

attachment to material existence and its thought forms. Mu is the omniscient mind of the

Buddha. No thought. No opinion. Unity with Mu is the beginning, and the ripening of

Zen practice. Mu is the focus, night and day, moment to moment of Mu koan practice.

Mu is the continuity of satori, ‚brief moments, many times.‛ Mu is the "lifelong, life-after-

life koan." When Mu is deeply understood no other koan is necessary. Mu is the

unfathomable mystery. There is no "why," no "how." ‚This cannot be taught‛ (Shakumuni

Buddha). It cannot be caught. It is useless to seek it. It’s merely Mu! Right here, always

now.

"Do not construe Mu as nothingness and do not conceive it in

terms of existence or non-existence. . . or as a problem

involving the existence or non-existence of Buddha-nature. . .

stop speculating and concentrate wholly on Mu - just Mu!"

Yasutani Roshi, in Kapleau (1980)

Therefore, seeking Mu, freedom, liberation, enlightenment, perfection, or happiness

is fruitless. The act or state of seeking (desire) precludes the result of happiness itself,

which is already present, now. ‚We cannot become happy. We can only be happy‛

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(Adi Da Samraj). We must pass through this gateless gate of emptiness, during life or at

death. But thinking about it cloaks it (maya), removes us from its immediacy, the

presence, now, that is our actual original nature. In duality we cannot concentrate. In the

dark empty sky, clouds arise and lightning flashes. Then the sky is dark and empty again.

Everything arises then returns in to its great source.

Who is it? Reality Itself is a vast, luminous emptiness. Therefore, concentrate on

nothing. Just sit and breathe. Whatever arises is pure clear light of the Mind that opens

into the very ground of being. Thus whatever arises is liberated, now, and now, and now.

So, ‚let it be exactly as it is.‛ Perfect openness. Perfect space. As it is already

accomplished, simply relax into it. This is who we are, without a single exception.

Can a moment last forever?

Endless circle our breath.

Days seasons kalpas

arising ceasing now

this blue eyed

little wildflower.

-David Paul Boaz (1999)

Midnight. No waves.

No wind. The empty boat

Flooded with moonlight.

- Anon.

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Zen Mind, Wisdom Mind

‚That everything is included in your mind

Is the essence of mind.‛

-Suzuki Roshi

In 1958 Shunryu Suzuki Roshi (1905-1971), a direct spiritual descendent of Dogen-

Zenji, founded the first Soto Zen Monastery in the West, the Zen Center of San Francisco

with its beautiful Zen Mountain Center at Tassajara, near Big Sur. Roshi was perhaps the

most influential Zen master in the West, and his masterpiece, Zen Mind, Beginners Mind is

truly a garland of nondual wisdom, and one of the most readable texts in contemporary

spiritual literature. Let the master’s words speak and enter in.

It is completely mistaken to think that whatever you do is Zen or that it does not matter

whether you practice or not. But if you make your best effort just to continue your

practice with your whole mind and body, without gaining ideas then whatever you do

will be true practice.... Establish your practice in your delusion. Shoshaku Jushaku. Just

continue.

Dogen Zenji said, ‚to give is non-attachment‛ just not to attach to anything is to give.

“Prajna Paramita,” the true wisdom of life, is that in each step of the way, the other shore

is actually reached... each step is the way of true giving.

Dogen-Zenji said, ‚To study Buddhism, is to study ourselves. To study ourselves is to

forget ourselves.‛ When we forget ourselves, we actually are the true activity of...

Reality itself. When we realize this fact, there is no problem whatever in this world.

Dogen-Zenji said, ‚Every existence is a flashing into the vast phenomenal world.‛ The

basic teaching of Buddhism is the teaching of impermanence or change... There is no

abiding self... No special, separate self-nature for each existence. . . When we realize this

truth we find ourselves in nirvana... Because we cannot, we suffer.

Emptiness is always here, and from it everything appears... So we can have no

attachment to any existence... This ‚no-mind‛ is Zen mind that includes everything...

The mind that is wisdom... Even before we practice it, enlightenment is here... Before

thinking, before practice... So your practice will not be self-centered... It is not after

attaining enlightenment that we find its true meaning. The trying to do it is

enlightenment. Which is more important; to attain enlightenment, or to attain

enlightenment before you attain enlightenment?

You must put confidence in the big mind which is always with you... It is possible in

this moment! It is this moment... Without any idea of attainment, you are always

Buddha... Now understand the true meaning of Buddha’s first statement, ‚See Buddha

Nature in the various beings, and in every one of us.‛

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Hakuin Zenji's Realization

The great 18th century reformer Hakuin's Zazen Wasan (Chant in Praise of Zazen) is a

profound expression of the realization that is Zen (exerpt translated by Philip Kapleau).

From the beginning all beings are Buddha.

Like water and ice. Without water no ice,

outside us no Buddhas.

How near the truth, yet how far we seek,

like one in water crying, "I thirst!" . . . .

The cause of our sorrow is ego delusion.

From dark path to dark path we've wandered

in darkness. How can we be free

of the wheel of samsara?

The gateway to freedom is zazen samadhi,

beyond exaltation, beyond all praises,

the pure Mahayana . . .

Thus one true samadhi extinguishes evils;

it purifies karma, dissolving obstructions.

Then where are the dark paths to lead us astray?

The pure lotus land is not far away. . . .

And if we turn inward and prove our

True-nature, that True-self is no self,

our own Self is no-self, we go beyond

ego and past clever words. The gate

to the oneness of cause-and-effect

is thrown open. . . Our form now

being no-form, in going and returning

we never leave home. Our thought now

being no-thought, our dancing and songs

are the voice of the Dharma. How vast

is the heaven of boundless samadhi!

How bright and transparent the moonlight

of wisdom! What it there outside us,

What is there we lack? Nirvana is

openly shown to our eyes. This earth

where we stand is the pure lotus land,

and this very body the body of Buddha.

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Zen and Dzogchen: Unifying the Ground and Result

From the beginning all beings are Buddha.

-Hui Neng

The nature of mind is Buddha from the beginning.

-Garab Dorje

The Graduated Path: A Most Unusual Paradox

The spiritual teachings that have arisen within the primordial Great Wisdom Tradition of

human history have a View (darshana, theory) which explains the Ground, the great Source of

all appearing reality, and a Path (marga) which establishes the Meditation (bhavana) that seeks

the continuity of recognition of the Ground leading to the Result or Fruition of the practice.

This endpoint is ‚the Fruit‛ that is ultimate realization of our inherently nondual primordial

wisdom sourceground. This final realization is seen as the essence, if not the cause of human

happiness, and in the highest nondual teaching of each tradition as ultimate Happiness Itself

(Paramananda, Mahasuka). In Buddhism this blissful Result is Buddhahood. The Path is the

confusion of the gradual seeking strategies to this ‚goal‛ of liberation enlightenment.

Regarding the View, the teaching is generally presented exoterically. Then, as knowledge

deepens to wisdom in the ‚advanced‛ practitioner the teaching becomes more and more

esoteric (inward, secret, nondual). Regarding the View of the Fruition (result/realization) of

the Path, it may be either gradual (zengo, rim-gyis-pa), or non-gradual (sudden, tongo, cig-car-

ba). In actual practice these two are interdependent. We ‚make the goal the path.‛ Yet it is

urgent that we understand the subtle differences, as we shall see.

The Buddhist gradualist path (zengo) of the sutras (Hinayana and Mahayana) and outer

tantras (Vajrayana) is a linear step-by-step, cause and effect progression of practices that

purify ignorance through application of transformational "antidotes" to the obscurations or

kleshas (desire/attachment, anger/aggression, ignorance) that veil (maya, vikshepa) the ‚goal‛

of the realization of the supreme source or Base (gzhi) as shunyata (stong-pa nyid), luminous

emptiness, the absence of inherent existence (nihsvabhavata). Ultimately, as this

enlightenment, this enlightened awareness, is stabilized, it may accomplish the Result that

is Buddhahood. On this gradual path with its ever increasing continuity of sudden

satori/samadhis (‚brief moments, many times‛), the practitioner becomes a Bodhisattva who

then ‚progresses‛ to ever subtler levels of demonstration of his/her enlightenment (the ten

levels or bhumis) through the everyday practice of the "perfections" (paramita) of wisdom,

compassion and meditative contemplation (quiescence/shamatha and penetrating

insight/vipashyana) on shunyata (luminous emptiness). In Zen shamatha/vipashyana is

shikantaza (joriki, advanced zazen meditation). The gradualist path "aims" at or seeks the

‚goal‛ of shunyata realization. The aspirant works gradually on the relative conditional self

through conceptual analysis – the discriminating wisdom of prajna (sherab, sophia) until

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certainty is ascertained and emptiness is realized. Nagarjuna (2nd century) regularly

reminds us that the only way to realize Absolute Truth is through liberating the

obscurations arising in the world of Relative Truth. Thus, Absolute or Ultimate Truth—

shunyata—is both origin and aim. While the gradualist path of the Hinayana and the

Mahayana uses prajna, the Inner Tantras, and especially the Ati Yoga of Dzogchen, utilize the

non-coneptual, nondual innate primordial wisdom (sahajajnana, yeshe, gnosis) the natural

luminosity of essential mind nature. This blissful intuitive wisdom cannot be grasped by

discursive, conceptual analytic meditation (prajna). It can only be directly realized

(pratyaksa), suddenly, through transmission and empowerment by the master. It is then

brought to fruition by nondual meditation under the guidance of the master. This

primordial wisdom is the Buddha Nature, the tathagatagarbha, that is the primordial ground

or base (gzhi), empty in essence, luminous by nature, and compassionate in manifestation.

In the non-gradualist (tongo, sudden) path of Dzogchen and of the mujodo no taigen of

nondual Saijojo Zen, our intrinsic Buddha Nature (tathagatagarbha) is already inherently

present in each individual, so there is nothing to seek. The presence (rigpa, vidya) of our

luminous primordial, original Buddha nature—Buddha Mind—is ‚always, already

present‛. "Wonder of wonders, All beings are Buddhas." The dualism of conditional

existence and of the exoteric gradualist path must be "cut through" (trekchö, kensho)

directly via the fiery concentrative force (tapas) of spiritual practice or sadhana aided by

direct transmission from the master (the Lama or the Roshi). "Introduce the state of

presence (rigpa) of mind nature directly" (Garab Dorje). "If the view is dualistic, there can

be no enlightenment" (Hui-neng). Of course, the necessary ngöndro or foundational

practices of Dzogchen and Shojo Zen are ‚gradualist,‛ preparing the student for the

liberating, sudden flashing realization of Absolute Truth, the always immediate presence

of rigpa that is satori. The tongo, sudden approach, as with zengo, the gradualist approach,

is a continuity of many sudden satori experiences opening into the vast emptiness ground

as we tread the ascending lifestage levels of realization, potentially all the way to

Buddhahood (Appendix A).

As we have seen, generally the view of the path of exoteric sutra is based on

renunciation and purification, the esoteric tantric path in transformation, and the radical

Maha Ati of the Dzogchen View is that the self-perfected state is the primordial presence of

Buddha mind is already present in each being. Buddha mind arises from the Buddha body

of ultimate reality (dharmakaya, chos-ku) personified as Samantabhadra, the Primordial Adi

Buddha whose ultimate realization is the Buddhahood of the individual. This concept-free

innate ‚pristine cognition‛ (dharmadhatujnana, chos-ying) of the vast expanse of Ultimate

Reality Itself (dharmata) is the emptiness (shunyata) base (gzhi) that is the actual nature of all

arising relative phenomenal reality. These two realities are the Two Truths (satyadvaya,

denpa-nyis), Relative and Absolute. The illusory or apparitional aspect of this primordial

Absolute Reality is the dependent arising of form as Maya or dharmin (Dudjom Rinpoche,

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1991). Again, Buddha mind is inherently present in all beings ‚from the very beginning,‛

or before. And it cannot be grasped or realized by discursive concept mind.

So the sutra and tantra views of Buddha Nature are antidotal, that is, we apply

cognitive and behavioral antidotes to the negative emotional afflictions or kleshas

(ignorance, desire/attachment, anger/aggression/hatred) as they arise. Just so, Buddha

Nature itself is the supreme antidote to such ignorance (avidya or marigpa). Again, the Ati

Yoga view of Dzogchen is that the state of presence of our Buddha Nature is already

present, awake, awaiting recognition, realization, then actualization through

compassionate conduct in the lifeworld. Thus there is no need of an antidote. Perhaps, we

are not yet Buddhas, but we are all already Buddha. ‚From the beinning, all beings are

Buddha‛ (Hui-neng). Alas, this true nature of ours is veiled or cloaked by ignorance

(avidya/maya).

This ‚state of presence‛ that is Buddha mind or Buddha gnosis (innate gnosis,

sahajajnana) is transmitted directly, from master to prepared student, then practiced by the

student. Again, Buddha Nature is the essential Nature of Mind, the very essence of the

primordial ground or base or source (kun-gzhi). According to the Prasangika Madhyamikas, this

vast emptiness base is not just a negative void, a ‚non-affirming emptiness,‛ but a luminous

clarity, a brightness that is an affirming emptiness, and it pervades all phenomena including

all us sentient beings. We are luminous beings of light! As this state of presence is originally

and perfectly pure (kadag), from the very beginning, obstructing thoughts, desires and

karmic actions need not be denied, renounced or transformed, but merely allowed to self-

liberate (rang grol, zenkan, kensho, satori)—at the very instant of their arising—into their

“primordially pure” source condition, the already present nondual awareness ground that

is always our actual original identity, our Zen mind-Buddha mind. Therefore, all of the

“slings and arrows” of our outrageous relative conventional existence are openings—an

aperture—into the blissful primordial ground of being. The knowing (prajna), and feeling

(bhakti) realization of this is the vast expanse of our Primordial Awareness Wisdom (jnana,

yeshe, gnosis), always already present here and now. Thus it is told by the radical nondual

wisdom teaching of Zen and Dzogchen.

Does Buddhahood Have a Cause? Unifying Ground and Result

This Ultimate Primordial Awareness Wisdom has many names. ‚Truth is one, many

are its names‛ (Rig Veda). As it is free of suffering, it is Absolute Bodhicitta. As it is nondual

from the very beginning, it is the inseparability of the Two Fundamental Truths (relative

and absolute). As it is the spontaneously present Mandala of the Ultimate Nature—the

Nature of the Three Vajras—it is the unseparate expanse of the epistemological unity of

samsara and nirvana. As it is always primordially pure (kadag) and spontaneously present

(lhundrup) it is Dharmakaya, the Mandala of Primordial Buddhahood. The ultimate

realization of this ontological indivisibility of the Primordial Ground or Base (gzhi) with its

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Fruition or Result is the full bodhi of liberation-enlightenment that is Buddhahood,

outpictured by the seed-syllable HUM, the pristine cognition that is Buddha mind. Such a

mind knows directly the phenomenal reality arising from the primordial ground (pratitya

samutpada, tendrel nyingpo) is simply the prior unity of the Two Truths—relative

appearance and absolute emptiness—the unelaborated purity (kadag) of the constant state

that is the unity of bliss and emptiness. Of course, such wisdom – gnosis, includes the

Two Truths of the Vajrayana, namely the primordial purity and the sameness (equality) of

phenomena that is the Great Dharmakaya (chos-ku chenpo), beyond mere emptiness

(Mipham, 2007).

However, if we fail to recognize and understand this radical nondual teaching— that

we and all beings, indeed, all of relative spacetime reality are ‚Buddha from the very

beginning‛—we will be unable to recognize, let alone realize, this ‚always already‛ present

primordial Mandala of the Base in whom all of the spacetime dimension of Relative Truth

spontaneously arises and participates. We may thereby limit our understanding to the less

direct Hinayana and Mahayana gradualist paths that assume that the Fruit that is

Buddhahood is a future goal that has a cause and that cause is the bodhicitta cultivated on

the gradualist path that subscribes to a program of ‚keeping watch over purity,‛ which is

the dualistic ‚tile polishing‛ and ‚dust wiping‛ path to enlightenment. The rub here is that

with all the future oriented purity practice, we forget that our in-dwelling Buddha Nature

‚is already accomplished.‛

According to this foundational, yet less direct view, only by such ritualistic goal

directed praxis can we purify the peripheral, adventitious negative emotional defilements

and accomplish the Fruit or Result that is Buddhahood. And this Result, according to the

Hinayana and Mahayana vehicles, takes many eons or kalpas. In this view—from the

dimension of mind that is relative phenomenal appearance—the Nature of Mind or Mind

Essence is primordially pure, yet is defiled by the destructive thought and action arising

from the ignorance (avidya/marigpa/ajnana) of human beings and therefore we must commit

to the gradualist path of purification and development of bodhicitta. And this purification of

defiled negative emotions (the kleshas) cultivates the relative bodhicitta that is seen as the

cause of Buddhahood. But if Buddhahood has a cause, then there exists an untidy duality or

separation between the ‚goal‛ of future Buddhahood, and our here now innate Buddha

Nature that is always present, at the heart, in all beings. In the Heruka Galpo Tantra we are

told, ‚In the expository vehicle of cause, living beings are known to be the cause of

Buddhas. In the resultant vajra vehicle, one mediates upon the Buddahood of mind itself.‛

Conversely, the view from the dimension of mind that is Absolute Truth—the mind’s

ultimate nature or mode of being—is subtly, yet profoundly different. This ‚secret,‛

‚greater esoteric‛ view that is the non-gradualist view of the Mahayana’s Saijojo Zen and

Vajrayana’s Ati Dzogchen and Essence Mahamudra is here transmitted by the great Jamgön

Mipham thusly:

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Because the sugatagarbha (Buddha Nature) consists in the

qualities of enlightenment, which are spontaneously present

from the very beginning, all the various paths that may be

implemented serve only to render these qualities manifest...

The paths simply render the primordial luminosity of the

dharmakaya manifest. They do not create (cause) it. . . When

the mandala of the primordial ground—the authentic nature

of primordial buddhahood—is realized, the mind becomes

inseparable from the wisdom of all the Buddhas of the three

times (past, present, future). The irreversible ground of

realization is thereby achieved. In that very instant supreme

mastery is found—in which the ground and fruit are

inseparably united.

Jamgön Mipham (2007)

Thus, all relative phenomenal appearance is suddenly realized to be the ultimate

truth of the prior, spontaneously pure primordial base. In this radical view, there is no

need of a purifying antidote. The presence—Buddha mind—is abundantly present,

always right here now. We need simply to surrender, to ‚relax, into it.‛ This is the great

perennial wisdom secret of Wu-wei, the effortless surrender or ‚relaxation into‛ the

source. This ‚sudden‛ (tongo) realization is actually a continuity or tantric continuum of

‚brief moments, many times‛—sudden samadhi/satori/moksha quantum event instants of

the primordial ground state that results from gradual practice of the path. This samadhi is

the atavistic, nondual Primordial Awareness Wisdom (yeshe, jnana, gnosis) that is

Dharmakaya, or the three Buddha Bodies of the ‚Trikaya of the Base‛ (Nirmanakaya,

Sambhogakaya, Dharmakaya). From this supreme nondual wisdom view that is Absolute

Truth, all of the appearing objective and subjective phenomena of the realm of Relative

Truth have never existed—have never separated from the trans-conceptual, trans-

personal spontaneously present mandala of the primordial ground. And this emptiness

Base (gzhi) is not other than the ultimate, perfectly subjective unbroken whole in whom

all realities are enfolded, the perfect sphere of Dzogchen. This sphere is the display ground

for all the unfolding, arising, objective and subjective relative-conventional, pure and

impure phenomenal mind projections/ productions (maya/vikshepa) that are the creative

‚deposits‛ of lila, the endless purposeless play of the duality of relative samsara and

nirvana of the three times—past, present and future.

When you fully realize this view and this practice, everything is the

infinite playful display of Buddha Bodies of light, and of primordial

wisdom. These are the stainless and spontaneous displays of reality

(cho nyi) itself, like the rays of the sun they are utterly pure...

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Ad.Zom Rinpoche (Translated by Anne Klein from Rinpoche’s Jigme

Lingpa Dzogchen Ngöndro, Heart Essence of the Vast Expanse (Longchen

Nyingthig).

Therefore, the non-gradualist path does not depend upon the relative-conventional

Law of Causality—cause and effect—to provide a relative cause for the ultimate truth of

Buddhahood. In this subtler, greater view, what appeared to be the distant ‚goal‛—our

primordially pure, beautiful original face—is always spontaneously present and awake at

the spiritual heart of all beings, right now. ‛Open the door... follow the path right to the

end‛ (H.H. The Dalai Lama).

Just as the surface of a mirror (melôn) remains unchanged by the images or reflections

which appear therein, the crystal, adamantine clarity and purity of this immediate

Primordial Awareness Wisdom (jnana, yeshe, gnosis) presence (vidya, rigpa) remains

untainted by the peripheral adventitious physical, emotional and mental appearances

that arise. Again, there is nothing to be purified, nothing to improve and nothing to seek.

No antidote is needed. No cause is necessary. Why? Because everything is ‚already

accomplished" (Garab Dorje). Buddha nature/Buddha mind is already the case. It is

‚always already‛ present at the spiritual heart. From this radical nondual view, the

gradualist path of seeking may seem to be a distraction. Alas, ‚Yet the seeds of past

action, karma, continue to cause further arising‛ (Shakyamuni Buddha). And thus,

paradoxically, we utilize the skillful method (upaya) and merit (prajna wisdom) of these

relative distractions to recognize, then realize the Absolute. At the beginning of the Path

we utilize the relative means of the Path to recognize, then realize that That which we

seek is already spontaneously present. ‚The only way to realize ultimate truth is through

Relative Truth‛ (Nargarjuna).

Of course, ultimately, the Two Truths are, as we have seen, aspects of a unitary

reality—one truth. Why? The conceptual dualistic dimension of Relative Truth is

necessarily, already subsumed in nondual Ultimate Truth. Not to put too fine a point on

it, but the Prasangika of the Middle Way (rangtong) has told it; no ultimately true assertion

can be made even as to this ultimate or Absolute Truth (paramartha), for all assertions are

merely the conceptual imputations and designations of Relative Truth (samvriti). Does

anything then exist ultimately? Yes and no. It depends upon the view, relative or

ultimate. Relative-conventional things—objective and subjective experiences— really do

exist in their relative dimension. However, ultimately, no objective or subjective thing

exists. And what is the ontological status of this metaphysical assertion? It is merely a

useful relative, conceptual presumption that applies only in the realm of relative truth.

The great paradoxical Ultimate Truth cannot be grasped conceptually. It can only be

realized, beyond concept and belief. Let us then further explore this most amazing

paradox of the Two Truths—relative form and ultimate emptiness—and its astonishing

resolution.

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Realizing the Emptiness of Emptiness

Although the Mahayana emphasizes the realization of the radical emptiness of

shunyata (Chin., wu, Tao, Jap., mu)—the fruit that is Buddhahood—and the Vajrayana,

especially the inner tantras, emphasizes the radiant presence of our Buddha Nature, the

nondual View of both Dzogchen and of Saijojo Zen is that shunyata is not merely a dark

‚non-affirming negative‛ emptiness. Rather, shunyata is, as we have seen, an affirming

negative because its actual nature is luminous clarity. There is an effulgent brightness to

this intrinsic emptiness of form. We must always remember that the Nature of Mind, the

Ultimate Source of all of this relative-conventional reality is ‚empty in essence, luminous

clarity in its nature, and compassionate in its lifeworld expression‛. Thus emptiness, the

Ultimate Truth, the ultimate reality, is in absence of any essential intrinsic nature. This

absence of essential nature is real. Emptiness, the ultimate reality, exists. But how does it

exist? Is it a vast ultimate, all embracing permanently existing substantive entity?

According to Buddhism’s highest or subtlest teachings—the Madhyamaka Prasangika,

(‚empty of self,‛ rangtong) and the Madhyamaka of the Definitive Meaning (‚empty of

Phenomena,‛ shentong) —shunyata exists only as relative-conventional truth, nominally or

conceptually, not as Ultimate Truth. Although relative-conventional things—objective or

subjective—are ‚findable‛ and real through ‚relative valid cognition‛ (inference, anumana),

emptiness itself is findable neither through relative valid cognition nor through ‚ultimate

valid cognition‛ (direct intuitive perception, pratyaksa). Thus, emptiness is devoid of self-

nature and cannot exist intrinsically. We must not reify and entify the emptiness of

phenomena into an absolute. Emptiness too is ultimately empty of inherent existence. This

ultimate ontological status of emptiness, the Dalai Lama terms the ‚emptiness of

emptiness.‛ Again, it cannot be grasped by the intellect. Can it be known? Yes. It may be

cognized through nondual Buddha gnosis, Buddha mind that is inseparable from Buddha

Nature (tathagatagarbha), the Buddha essence of all beings, and indeed of all appearing

reality. This always present primordial wisdom (gnosis, jnana, yeshe) is the samadhi of

realization of the luminous emptiness and primal unity of all of the apparent dualities—

form/ emptiness, purity/ impurity, apparent /absent—of Buddhist hermeneutics.

Therefore, there are not ultimately ‚Two Truths,‛ —emptiness and form—for if there

were, it would logically follow that Relative Truth would be Absolute Truth (the relative

subsumed in the absolute) which contradicts the basic concept of Two Truths. Is this then,

one truth viewed conceptually in two modalities? Is Absolute Truth merely the ultimate

unreality of Relative Truth? Does the one all-embracing Absolute Truth absolutely

subsume apparently, obviously real Relative Truth? Yes, yes, and yes. The Two Truths that

are the one truth exist only conventionally. Everything exists merely as dependant arising

from emptiness (pratitya samutpada). But this is not the final view. Such logical discourse is

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mere conceptual elaboration, useful in leading us to the edge, the logical, epistemological

limit of discursive mind. Beyond this is the truth of utterly non-conceptual “Mu!”

Again, this can only be realized in the ‚pristine cognition‛ of emptiness (chos-ying yeshe,

dharmadhatujnana), the vast expanse of Basic Space that is sublime Buddha mind, perfect,

luminous nondual primordial awareness wisdom (gnosis, sahajajnana, yeshe). But if all of

this is mere relative-conventional ideational concept and belief, how do we finally establish

a meaningful coalescence of the unity and multiplicity of the Two Truths that are the

unbroken whole of non-dual Reality Itself? For this we must return to the radical nondual

view and practice of Anuttara Yogatantra, and to Ati Dzogchen (Ch. II).

Enlightenment: Sudden or Gradual?

What can be asserted here is that the non-gradualist, tongo nondual view of Dzogchen

and Saijojo Zen holarchically transcends yet embraces the gradualist renunciation view of

the sutras and the transformation view of the outer tantras (and even of the inner tantras of

Mahayoga and Anuyoga), just as the radical and revolutionary nondual teaching of Hui-

neng’s tongo transcended and included the dualistic gradualist view that characterized

Ch'an Buddhism in China in the fifth century, CE. Thus as Hui Neng told, sudden tongo

and gradual zengo enlightenment are a prior unity. Both are necessary aspects of the path.

This ecumenical (rime), unitary view continues today in Zen as the nondual view of

Saijojo Zen in both the Soto and Rinzai schools, and in the inner Madhyamaka of the

Definitive Meaning, and in Essence Mahamudra, and in Ati Dzogchen of the Vajrayana.

Therefore, the perennial Buddhist hermeneutical problem regarding sudden

versus gradualist liberation is a false dichotomy. The above mentioned traditions all

permit sudden enlightenment while utilizing a gradual path. Mipham and other rime

masters have argued that the sudden intuition of primordial wisdom (gnosis, yeshe) in

both Essence Mahamudra and Ati Dzogchen is compatible with the gradualist, analytical

view of the Madhyamikas. Indeed, according to Mipham (1999), the gradualist dialectics of

Prasangika permit a ‚sudden‛ liberation of the ‚Four Extremes of Elaboration‛ (sprospa)

that is similar to Dzogchen’s establishment of kadag. Nagarjuna told it two thousand years

ago. We accomplish sudden enlightenment through gradual practice. That is, we

accomplish a gradual continuity of sudden satoris, ‚brief moments, many times,‛ until the

full bodhi of irreversible liberation. But we must remember, the Buddha essence is

always, already present and awake at the Heart, whatever praxis we indulge.

So, at the highest or subtlest level, the ‚innermost secret‛ teaching holarchically

transcends yet includes the previous dualistic limitations of human created sects, schools,

sectarian bias and all the rest—the conceptual, outer/exoteric and inner/esoteric relative-

conventional aspects of Buddhism. The same is true of the great nondual practices of

Advaita Vedanta (Chap. IV), and nondual Valentinian and Thomas Gnostic Christianity

(Chap. V).

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Happiness Itself: The End of All Our Seeking

Therefore, the Ati Yoga of Dzogchen and the Mujodo no taigen of Saijojo Zen exemplify

the archetypal primordial wisdom teaching that has always arisen as part of the nondual

Primordial Wisdom Tradition of self-conscious species in this, and other star systems for

eons (Norbu, 1999). This great ecumenical teaching does not, under the guidance of a

qualified master, suffer the dualistic limitations and religious dogmas of the limited egoic

structures that have conceptually unpacked the teaching on their various exoteric and

esoteric paths to liberation. However, as the heart essence of the teaching is dependent

upon direct "heartmind to heartmind" transmission from master to prepared disciple,

realization of the great ecumenical teaching requires this very relationship within the

context of a specific tradition (Buddhist, Hindu, Taoist, Islam) and the wisdom

personality of an individual living master or masters abiding within that tradition.

Shakyamuni the Buddha, Jesus the Christ, Padmasambhava, Longchen Rabjam,

Shankara, and many other Buddhas and adept realizers, past and present, appear in their

avataric Nirmanakaya forms in different times and places to transmit this great nondual

primordial wisdom teaching to those teachers and students who have recognized the

love-wisdom imprint, and have prepared to receive it. These sublime avatars embody

and transmit the primordial presence (vidya, rigpa, Atman, Christos/logos) of the "Buddha

Nature" or the "Christ Nature" or the Atman that lives, awake, if cloaked (maya), within

each human form. "We must never forget the Tathagatas . . . the thousand Buddhas.

There exist many, many ways for realized beings to manifest themselves and for the

teaching to arise" (Chögyal Namkhai Norbu).

Is one nondual tradition ultimately superior to another? It depends on the view,

relative or absolute. Sectarian bias, from gross to subtle, is natural to the relative view. As

to the absolute view, ‚Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one remains silent‛ (Ludwig

Wittgenstein). Through this Silence (mouna) the ultimate view of each tradition speaks

one truth (paramartha satya) in many tongues. But of course, we cannot remain silent in

the face of such profundity. ‚No small matter is at stake. The question concerns the very

way in which human life is to be lived‛ (Plato, Republic, Book I).

In all cases, meditation masters caution against three errors: 1) the error of egoic

separation from the inherently divine presence within; 2) the error of attachment to the

form of the teaching and its practices (with the resulting sectarian bias); and 3) the error

of the idealized exoteric worship of the spacetime physical form or personage of the

master. Any one of these can derail the necessary, difficult self-transcending

practice/sadhana required by the path.

The nondual primordial wisdom teaching is this: The numinous presence of the

Buddha, the Atman, the Christ, the Tao, by whatever name, is the divine nature and

supreme source of the bodymind, always already spontaneously present and awake at

the spiritual heart of every human being. The teaching, the practice and the master

219

mirror or transmit this utterly ineffable miracle directly, non-conceptually, to the

prepared aspirant. Yet the aspirant must train the mind and the heart first through

dualistic, but finally through nondual, non-graduated practice (the desideratum devoutly

to be wished). This is the union of quiescence meditation (shamatha) and insight

meditation (vipashyana) that opens the conceptual cage and releases the profound blessing

of ultimate truth that is always here, now Happiness Itself (paramananda, mahasuka). Such

is the nondual teaching of our great Primordial Wisdom Tradition, and of the great

teaching of Ati Dzogchen and Saijojo Zen.

On the Nondual View of Dzogchen and Zen:

In terms of the source, the root of all phenomena, there is no such thing

as an observer and an object to observe. All the phenomena of

existence, without exception, abide in the supreme source in a

condition of birthlessness . . . As the supreme source (Samantabhadra),

pure and total consciousness, I am the mirror in which all phenomena

are reflected. Although lacking self-nature everything exists clearly;

without need for a view, the nature shines clear. Understanding the

essential unborn condition is not an object to observe dualistically. This

is the great understanding!

-Kunjed Gyalpo, The Supreme Source (trans. Namkhai Norbu)

From the beginning all beings are Buddha . . . If we turn inward and

prove our true nature, that true self, is no-self . . . our form now being

no-form... our thought now being no-thought . . . this earth where we

stand is the pure lotus land, and this very body the body of Buddha.

-Hakuin Zenji (trans. Philip Kapleau)

Historiographical Note

Neither the Buddha, nor Jesus, nor Shankara, nor Lao Tzu created a school or a

religion. The schools, sects and cults of religion are human inventions and bear the

limitations, distortions and dualism of secondary human gross and subtle egoic

ignorance (avidya) as we conceptually and experientially unpack their view and

meditation teachings.

That the esoteric and nondual teaching of Zen and Dzogchen are historically associated

with Buddhism, does not mean that they began with or are limited to historical Buddhism.

Dzogchen, for example, was practiced by the ancient pre-Buddhist Bonpos of the indigenous

Tibetan Bon wisdom teaching, and by the pre-historic "Twelve Teachers of Dzogchen"

centuries before the incarnation of the historical Nirmanakaya Buddha Shakyamuni (Norbu,

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1999). Just so, esoteric Christianity teaches ‚That which is called the Christian religion

existed among the ancients, and never did not exist, from the beginning of the human race

until Christ came in the flesh.‛ (St. Augustine, Ch.V). Nor does the fact that Nyingma

Dzogchen was influenced by Shivaism and Ch’an, or that Ch’an and Zen were influenced by

Taoism mean that one is derived from or reducible to the other. As we recover from our

habitual, linear cause and effect thinking we see that all of the traditions of our great

Primordial Wisdom Tradition have arisen not so much one from another in a linear

historical cause and effect chain, although these influences exist, but interdependently, as a

continuum from the Primordial Wisdom Base. The various traditions of our Great Wisdom

Tradition all respond to the primordial wisdom of this same ultimate ground of arising

reality forms. Contemplation and meditation upon this ‚wisdom of emptiness‛ opens

equally into that ground for all of them.

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Who Is It?

In whom does this all arise?

-Adi Da Samraj

The primary Dzogchen tantra, The Kunjed Gyalpo (The Supreme Source), must be

considered one of humankind’s great spiritual treasures. According to Chögyal Namkhai

Norbu, this supreme non-dual teaching has been transmitted from master to disciple

directly, heartmind to heartmind, for thousands of years. Its current tantric version dates

from the 8th century C.E., and is a fundamental tantra of the Dzogchen semde (mind)

teaching series. This version of the great nondual primordial wisdom teaching is derived

from Buddhist sutra and tantra understanding of the Nature of Mind, yet its truth essence

runs, like a golden thread, through the grand tapestry of humankind’s Primordial Great

Wisdom Tradition. Kunjed Gyalpo, The Wise and Glorious King is Samantabhadra/

Samantabhadri in inseparable yabyum embrace—androgenous primordial Adi Buddha—

state of pure presence, clarity and emptiness that is actually our original Buddha nature,

Supreme Source, Basis, primordial womb of everything. Samantabhadra, this Ultimate

Dharmakaya Buddha speaks to Vajrasattva, the Sambhogakaya Buddha:

The essence of all the Buddhas exists prior to samsara and nirvana . . . it

transcends the four conceptual limits and is intrinsically pure; this original

condition is the uncreated nature of existence that always existed, the ultimate

nature of all phenomena. . . It is utterly free of the defects of dualistic thought

which is only capable of referring to an object other than itself. . . It is the base of

primordial purity. . . Similar to space it pervades all beings. . . The inseparability

of the two truths, absolute and relative is called the ‘primordial Buddha’. . . If at

the moment the energy of the base manifests, one does not consider it something

other than oneself . . . it self-liberates. . . Understanding the essence . . . one finds

oneself always in this state. . . dwelling in the fourth time, beyond past, present

and future. . . the infinite space of self-perfection. . . pure dharmakaya, the

essence of the vajra of clear light.

- Chögyal Namkhai Norbu, The Supreme Source, (1999)

Thus do the sutras and the tantras of Buddha’s teaching, the dualities of the path—

objective and subjective, self and other, observer and data, true and false, relative and

ultimate—abide in the prior unity of the dependently arisen perfect sphere of infinite Mind

Nature, luminous innate clear light mind that is always the unity of awareness and

emptiness. Who is it, that I am? All the masters of the three times have told it. This infinite

vast expanse of the primordial awareness wisdom continuum is who we actually are. Tat

tvam ami. That, I Am! That is our supreme identity, great perfection of our always present

Buddha nature, deep heartseed presence of ultimate happiness that is both origin and aim

of all our seeking.

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Being the Primordial Awareness Wisdom* The Non-Meditation That is Happiness Itself

Now is the moment we abide in primordial essence

Luminous nature of mind

empty awake awareness itself

Whatever experience arises

Pleasant neutral unpleasant

no need to change it

Whatever arises let it be

without judgment positive or negative

without past or future

without attachment or aversion

without affirmation or denial

without closeness or distance

Whatever arises is pure clear light of mind

opening into the very ground of being

Thus whatever arises is liberated

Now let it be exactly as it is

Perfect openness

Perfect space

As it is already accomplished

Simply relax into it

________________________

* Excerpted from Stromata, Fragments of the Whole: Selected Essays of David Paul Boaz (Dechen Wangdu), ©2009

David Paul Boaz. All rights reserved. www.davidpaulboaz.org, Copper Mountain Institute, info@coppermount.org,

www.coppermount.org 505-898-959

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